Abstract

Previous research has shown that people can implicitly acquire mappings between word forms and literal meanings . We argue, from the metaphor-representation and embodiment perspectives, that people can unconsciously establish mappings between word forms and not only literal but also metaphorical meanings. Using Williams’ paradigm, we found that transfer of form-meaning connections from a concrete domain to an abstract domain was achieved in a metaphor-consistent way without awareness. Our results support the view that unconscious knowledge can be flexibly deployed in an abstract way not previously explored in the implicit learning literature