Verbalization of the emotive concept “Fear”: Linguacognitive and linguacultural aspects

The process of changing the linguistic paradigm determined the principle of anthropocentrism in scientific research in the field of language, that is, the orientation towards the subject, his worldview, for the study of which intralinguistic and extralinguistic factors are used. It is this fact that has determined the objectification of mental phenomena with the help of the concept of “concept”, which has got its own specificity in cognitive science and in linguacultural studies. This is one of the aspects of the relevance of the study; the second is related to the need of correcting this concept and clarify the means of its representation. The aim of the study is to analyze a significant problem of both cognitive science and linguacultural studies: the construction of the concept of “fear”, which has received the status of emotive-­cognitive in a number of works, the identification of areas of intersection with related concepts, indicating the dynamics of this phenomenon. The methodology in the study is based on the conceptual provisions of these sciences. Various methods have been used, including: sema analysis, the method of dictionary definitions, the etymological analysis, and the field structuring. Results of the study: a definition of the concept of “fear” is given based on the correlation with definitions in philosophy, psychology, linguistics. Relying on the definition, a structuring of the concept related to the segmental type is produced; the core of the concept is identified, which forms segments that are semantically equivalent in terms of the degree of abstraction. A conclusion is made about the status of the concept under study: the concept of “fear” is a mental structure of the psychophysiological type.