PSYCHOLINGUISTIC ANALYSIS OF THE CONCEPT “FAMILY”

Abstract

This article is devoted to the study of the structure and content of the concept “FAMILY” through the construction of its associative field with the help of an associative experiment as a leading psycholinguistic method. The article defines the basic thesis and describes the methodology of the conducted research. Associative experiment is aimed at studying verbal representatives of the content of consciousness and allows us to identify the reality, specifically reflected in the submission of the individual. On the basis of the data of the associative experiment, it is possible to construct an associative-semantic network of the carrier of a particular culture. The associative field is defined as a set of associative responds on a word-stimulus. The structure of the associative field of the concept “FAMILY” is considered as containing the core and peripheral zone. It is proved that the reactions with the highest frequency index form the core of the associative field, while the associatives, given by some or some participants in the experiment, form its peripheral zone. Among the existing types of the associative experiment, a free associative experiment was chosen for this study. According to the experiments, the associative stimulus field of the family was formed. The key words representing the core of the concept “FAMILY” and forming the periphery of the concept were selected. For a more detailed understanding of the concept, the data was arranged according to the frequency of associations and theme. It was noted that among the lexemes used to describe the concept “FAMILY”, nouns predominate in terms of the attitude towards the family and its members, and also the adjectives are available for the indication of family members and place of residence. It was proved that among the resulting associations reactions with positive and neutral connotations predominate, while the number of reactions with negative connotation is negligible. As a possible perspective of further research, the construction of the associative field of the concept “FAMILY” on the material of thesauri presented in modern English explanatory dictionaries was proposed.