An Overview of the Cognitive Research on Polysemous Words in English

A cognitive perspective has helped to account for the phenomenon of polysemy, which the earlier traditional linguistic theories failed to illuminate.This paper presents an overview of and comments on the cognitive research into polysemous words in English, covering such aspects as the lexical items researched, the modes and mechanisms revealed by which lexical meanings are extended, the approaches employed in the relevant research, etc.Some drawbacks and problems are therefore identified to provide some insights for future research in this field.