The psychology of language 1 : A theoretical analysis of 'meaning'

The present paper was intended to be a limited attempt to clarify various types of misconception and confusion as regards the concept of 'meaning' with the ultimate aim of proposing a most satisfactory and comprehensive definition of 'meaning.' To do this the discussion was centered around the following two topics: (1) On the context of 'meaning: and (2) On the concept of 'meaning.' In the former, we came to apprehend the scope and complexity of the concept of 'meaning.' We later isolated wherefrom three fundamental factors involved, viz., physical reality, signs, and organism. In the latter, various concepts of 'meaning: both linguistic and psychological, were critically reviewed and discussed with the aim set at finding out what constitutes the psychophysiological basis of 'meaning.' The present writer chose to identify 'meaning' with the complex of implicit responses of some sort. The functions and properties of these responses were explicitly stated. The present paper also touched on some related subtopics. They were (1) distinction between denotation and connotation, (2) distinction between 'meanings' of physical object and sign, and (3) how to handle individual and contextual variations in 'meaning.'In connection with the last subtopic, a novel concept - the stable core meaning (SCM) was introduced