Question

What role does the mental lexicon play in the language comprehension process?

Answer 1

Language comprehension process is the process of understanding the written and spoken language.

Mental lexicon is the mental dictionary about the meaning, pronunciation, syntax and spelling of a word. It keeps on developing and increasing throughout life span(shrinks as individuals age) . Newer words and pronunciations are added to the mental lexicon.

Thus the mental lexicon brings about understanding of the words used. For example if one hears the word 'out'. In this case the mental lexicon for the word 'out' would be sparked in the semantic network either by priming,neighborhood effects or frequency effects which means activation by reduction of reaction time for the specific word, activation of similar neighbouring words like out or activation of words more easily which are used often respectively.

Thus mental lexicon plays a significant role in language comprehension as mentioned above.