We are pleased to announce that Marco Marelli (University of Milano-Bicocca) will deliver a keynote lecture at Lexical Morphology 2026 Online.
Professor Marelli’s research lies at the intersection of psycholinguistics, cognitive science, and computational linguistics, with a particular focus on how meaning is represented and processed in the mind. His work explores the role of semantics in language and memory, as well as the relationship between language, sensorimotor experience, and conceptual representation.
Combining experimental methods, cognitive neuroscience, and computational modelling, his research offers a highly interdisciplinary perspective on how humans process language. He is currently Principal Investigator of the ERC-funded project BraveNewWord, which investigates how the meanings of unfamiliar words emerge through compositionality and statistical learning, particularly in morphologically complex forms.
Keynote Lecture
Systematicity and Morphology in the Processing of Unfamiliar Words
We learn new words almost on a daily basis: as adults, a new element is introduced in our vocabulary every other day. With new words, we also learn about new objects and ideas – this steady lexical learning seems to constitute a most important source of expansion for the semantic system. However, when we experience, as adults, a new word, its referent is not typically immediately available in the same context. How then can we comprehend novel words, simply on the basis of an unfamiliar sequence of sounds or graphical elements?
Reliable distributional associations between the form of a word and its meaning seems to be the main driving force (along with linguistic context) behind such remarkable ability. Such systematicity is a prominent property of natural languages, and speakers are shown to largely exploit it via statistical learning. While lexical morphology is the most obvious and well-described example of systematicity, it arguably represents the tip of the proverbial iceberg within a more nuanced, continuous, and pervasive phenomenon.
In this talk I will address the role of systematic and morphological patterns in the comprehension of novel words in a computational psycholinguistic perspective, moving from the tenets of distributional semantics and applying a series of models that induce meaning representations by leveraging on sublexical elements. Through such an approach, one can obtain predictions concerning the meaning of unfamiliar words, that can in turn be tested in psycholinguistic experiments. I will show how model predictions align with behavioral data from a number of studies, providing meaningful estimates for morphologically complex and simple novel words. I will further address which role for morphology remains, once lexicalist assumptions are abandoned and models are allowed to rely on the semantic contribution of any possible sublexical unit.
In conclusion, the talk will show how systematicity plays a central role in how humans access meaning, and how sublexical elements guide the processing of unfamiliar words. Distributional models that are enriched by such sublexical information represent a useful tool for psycholinguistic investigations in this domain.
View Marco Marellis’ full speaker profile: Marco Marelli – Keynote Speaker
Lexical Morphology 2026 Online
The International Linguistic Society invites submissions for Lexical Morphology 2026 Online, taking place 23–25 September 2026. The conference aims to advance research in lexical morphology and explore how word formation and lexical representation interact with cognition, language processing, and real-world applications.
We welcome contributions across a wide range of topics, including:
- Lexical morphology research: theoretical, experimental, and applied
- Core areas: inflection, derivation, compounding, and lexical representation
- Interdisciplinary work: psycho-, neuro-, and computational approaches to morphological and lexical processing
- Applications: language education, language disorders, corpus linguistics, lexicography, and language technology
The conference will feature keynotes by leading scholars, oral and poster presentations, and fully virtual participation. Accepted abstracts will be published as expanded 4-page papers in the Linguistic Proceedings Series.
Venue:
Virtual Event (online participation only)
How to Submit:
Visit the conference page for submission instructions and updates:
Lexical Morphology 2026 Online – International Conference on Lexical Morphology Research and Applications
Contact:
For inquiries, please contact the Organising Committee at contact@linguistic-society.com.
Join us online to share your research, connect with international scholars, and contribute to the advancement of lexical morphology and its applications.
