Influences of the Relationship of a Picture and its Referent on Understandability of a Concept

Abstract

Pictures are sometimes a good way to convey concepts. When a picture is used as an index of its referent to explain a concept, the understandability of the concept depends on the relationship of the picture and its referent. In this article, we considered the reason for this “relationship influence” by using two seemingly heterogeneous measures, subjective distance and reaction time to connect a picture and its referent. We used word association and perceptual simulation to determine what the picture represented and whether it was relevant to its referent, and a combination of these two strategies affected reaction time. The ease in making a path from a referent to a picture and a referent belonging to the basic level are the conditions when using word association. Strength of corporal sense, especially tactual and adjacency, depends on the relationships effect on understandability of a concept.