Chapter 1 A Critical Survey of Color Research 1
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Alternative perspectives 2
1.2.1 Philosophical reflections 2
1.2.2 Anthropological surveys 4
1.2.3 Ethnographic investigations 6
1.2.4 Neuro-physiological explanations 7
1.2.5 Genetic findings 9
Preface(胡壮麟先生序) 9
Foreword(前言) 11
1.2.6 Psychological experiments 12
1.2.7 Linguistic contributions 13
1.3 Competing explanations 14
1.3.1 Epistemic orientation 14
1.3.2 Linguistic orientation 16
Acknowledgement 17
1.3.3 Cross-linguistic evidence 18
Abstract in Chinese(论文摘要) 19
Abstract 21
List of Abbreviations 23
1.4 Correlations between color lexicon and society 26
2.1 Sociolinguistics and the color lexicon 29
2.1.1 Introduction 29
Chapter 2 Why Conduct Experimental Research from a Sociolinguistic Perspective? 29
2.1.2 Theorizing in sociolinguistics 30
2.1.3 Quantitative research and gender study 31
2.1.4 Sociolinguistics and its application 32
2.2 Applied linguistics and the color lexicon 33
2.2.1 Introduction 33
2.2.2 Color lexicon and mental storage 34
2.2.3 The elicitation dilemma in research 34
2.2.4 Color codability in native and foreign languages 36
2.2.5 Language proficiency and color codability 36
2.3.1 Introduction 37
2.3 A holistic sociolinguistic study of the color lexicon 37
2.3.2 A stratified classification of basic color words 38
2.3.3 Criteria for the basic color lexicon 38
2.3.4 A stratified classification of fancy/elaborated color words 40
2.3.5 A reclassification of the color lexicon 40
2.3.6 Semantics of the restricted and elaborated color lexicon 41
Chapter 3 Experiment Design and Data Collection 46
3.1 General introduction to the whole project 46
3.1.1 Introduction 46
3.1.2 Experimental groups 48
3.2 Methods and data collection 49
3.2.1 Subjects 49
3.2.3 Procedures 50
3.2.2 Materials for naming 50
3.2.4 Data categorization 51
3.2.5 Academic records 53
3.2.6 Vocabulary scores 54
3.2.7 Demographic parameters 54
3.2.8 Hobbies correlations 56
3.2.9 Post-hoc interview 56
3.3 Experimental hypotheses 57
3.3.1 Sex hypotheses 58
3.3.2 Language hypotheses 58
3.3.3 Demographic hypotheses 59
4.1 Introduction 62
Chapter 4 Color Performance 62
4.2 Main Experiment 63
4.2.1 Data and analyses 63
4.2.2 Discussion 71
4.3 Follow-up Experiment 72
4.3.1 Data and analyses 73
4.3.2 Discussion 81
4.4 Comparative Experiment 82
4.4.1 Data and analyses 82
4.4.2 Discussion 90
5.1 Introduction 93
Chapter 5 Group Differences 93
5.2 Comparison 94
5.2.1 Comparison across three groups 95
5.2.2 Comparison between the main ＆ follow-up groups 95
5.2.3 Comparison between the follow-up ＆ comparative groups 97
5.2.4 Comparison between main ＆ comparative groups 99
Chapter 6 Discussion，Conclusion and Implication 103
6.1 Introduction 103
6.2 Summary discussion for experimental groups 104
6.3 Summary discussion for group comparisons 106
6.4 Summary discussion for group differences 107
6.5 Limitations 113
6.6 Implications for relevant sciences 114
6.6.1 What is the position of sociolinguistics in language teaching? 116
6.6.2 What is the position of gender in language learning? 116
6.6.3 What is the position of cognition in lexical development? 117
6.6.4 What is the position of biological and genetical differences in color coding? 118
6.6.5 What is the position of“nature”and“nurture” in color coding? 119
6.6.6 What is the position of demography and(sub-) culture in color coding? 119
6.6.7 What is the position of language proficiency or formal language training at school in color coding? 120
6.6.8 What is the position of awareness and frustration in color coding? 120
6.6.9 What can we do to help learners build up a bigger color vocabulary? 121
Works Cited 126
Appendixes 147