A Spreading-Activation Theory of Semantic Processing

A Spreading-Activation Theory of Semantic Processing Allan M. Collins Elizabeth F. Loftus

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A Spreading-Activation Theory of Semantic Processing 1975 Psychological Review 10.1037/0033-295X.82.6.407 collins-loftus1975-spreading-activation collins-loftus1975-spreading-activation.txt, the project's staged copy 42714ae140622e4f70b7875ea12c032030cb14a0 personal-copy cognitive-psychology

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0 spans located by searching the stored text for the quote's exact words, allowing any whitespace between them mechanism Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. semantic memory retrieval and semantic priming Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. review review Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. The authors flag that their elaboration of Quillian's theory may itself be wrong. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. They do not weigh alternative explanations of the experiments they reinterpret. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. The set of evidence types postulated is not exhaustive. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. As a computational prescription the theory omits many decision-strategy details. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. spreading activation spreading activation Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. priming priming Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. concept nodes concept nodes Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. intersection intersection Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. THE SENTENCE THE PRIMING LITERATURE IS BUILT ON: `Quotation withheld.` Every semantic-priming record in this corpus argues about, extends or tests this - and the parenthetical `(or priming)` is the term arriving inside the theory that would carry it. The corpus now holds the model itself and not only the papers that assume it Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. AND THE ORIGIN NOTE, WHICH IS THE MOST USEFUL SENTENCE HERE FOR A PROJECT LOOKING AT LLMs: `Quotation withheld.` Quillian wanted to implement it. A computational proposal became the field's psychological explanation, and the paper that completed the conversion says so in its second paragraph. The traffic between computation and psychology has run both ways here since 1962, and this record marks the turn Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. AND SEARCH IS DEFINED AS TWO WAVEFRONTS MEETING: `Quotation withheld.` Not a lookup and not a strength comparison - **a geometry.** That is what makes semantic DISTANCE meaningful in this model and why the whole downstream literature measures relatedness in path terms Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. AND THE MODEL PAYS FOR ITS OWN GENEROSITY, WHICH IS WHAT MAKES IT TESTABLE: `Quotation withheld.` A conservation constraint, derived from two numbered assumptions rather than added to fit a result. It predicts that priming cannot scale freely - a cost an unconstrained associative account does not carry, and a prediction later work can collect Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. `semantic relatedness` vs `semantic distance` - DISTINGUISHED HERE AND CONFLATED IN THE FIELD, in one sentence: `a slightly different notion ... though the two terms are sometimes used interchangeably`. The paper draws the distinction and reports that its field does not keep it. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. extends → Quillian's (1966, 1969) spreading-activation theory of semantic memory Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. contradicts → the Smith, Shoben and Rips (1974) feature-comparison model differs in: THE AXIS IS WHETHER ALL JUDGEMENTS USE ONE MECHANISM. The span names it as a 'fundamental disagreement' and states both sides in one clause: 'Quotation withheld, including superordinate links.' Feature-comparison as the sole route, against evidence of any available kind. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. contradicts → Conrad's (1972) argument that the Collins and Quillian (1969) results are confounded by property frequency Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. spreading activation —causes→ priming spreading activation priming direction on the measure: increases · strength of the relation: 0.95 · note: THE FOUNDATIONAL EDGE OF THIS CORPUS'S SUBJECT. Activation spreads from the primed concept's node and the effects of priming follow. Weight 0.95: it is the theory's own statement of its own mechanism, in the paper that established it, cited 5,530 times. Note the verb is 'explained' - this is a proposed mechanism, not a measurement, and everything measurable about it is downstream. The corpus holds the measurements elsewhere; this is where they get their meaning. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. concept nodes —causes→ intersection concept nodes intersection direction on the measure: increases · strength of the relation: 0.9 · note: SEARCH AS A GEOMETRY: two wavefronts, and the search ends where they meet. The edge records that intersections are PRODUCED by activation spreading from multiple nodes rather than being looked up. Weight 0.9 rather than 0.95 - the quote is Collins and Loftus reporting Quillian's original formulation, and their own paper then adds the threshold that makes an intersection cost something (fourth concept). Audit 2026-09-28: DOUBTFUL - read against its span and kept, but the span describes search spreading from concept nodes until an intersection is found; causes is loose. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. A concept is a node in a network, with its properties represented as labeled relational links to other concept nodes. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. spreading activation spreading activation about this quote: QUOTE RECOVERED FROM THE PAPER'S OWN CHARACTERS. The recorded quote was LETTERS-ONLY IDENTICAL to this stretch of the staged text but not an exact substring of it - spaces, hyphens, ligature glyphs or mathematical operators differed, so it could never anchor. This is the file's own text between the same two letters: not produced by a rule about the damage, copied out of the file. Round-trip checked (the recovered span is letters-only equal to the original) and length-checked. The text as originally recorded is kept in evidence as extracted. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution. Bayesian Bayesian about this quote: QUOTE RECOVERED FROM THE PAPER'S OWN CHARACTERS. The recorded quote was LETTERS-ONLY IDENTICAL to this stretch of the staged text but not an exact substring of it - spaces, hyphens, ligature glyphs or mathematical operators differed, so it could never anchor. This is the file's own text between the same two letters: not produced by a rule about the damage, copied out of the file. Round-trip checked (the recovered span is letters-only equal to the original) and length-checked. The text as originally recorded is kept in evidence as extracted. Quotation withheld because this record is not cleared for redistribution.

The full text of this article is not redistributable, so it is not included here. The evidence sentences are withheld with it; the tag layer and its grounding status remain. The article itself is at https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.82.6.407.