Conceptual information on objects' locations

According to traditional views, basic and subordinate concepts elicit perceptual information, superordinate concepts abstract information. Two experiments showed that also superordinate concepts activate perceptual and contextual information. In Experiment 1 participants evaluated the adequacy of Scene- and Object-like locations ascribed to basic and superordinate concepts. Superordinate concepts were judged faster when paired with Scene-like locations, where many exemplars can coexist, than with Object-like locations. The results were replicated and extended in the second experiment with a location production task. Theoretical accounts for the results are discussed.