Figurative language is a challenge for language models since its interpretation is based on the use of words in a way that deviates from their conventional order and meaning. Yet, humans can easily understand and interpret metaphors, similes or idioms as they can be derived from embodied metaphors. Language is a proxy for embodiment and if a metaphor is conventional and lexicalised, it becomes easier for a system without a body to make sense of embodied concepts. Yet, the intricate relation between embodiment and features such as concreteness or age of acquisition has not been studied in the context of figurative language interpretation concerning language models. Hence, the presented study shows how larger language models perform better at interpreting metaphoric sentences when the action of the metaphorical sentence is more embodied. The analysis rules out multicollinearity with other features (e.g. word length or concreteness) and provides initial evidence that larger language models conceptualise embodied concepts to a degree that facilitates figurative language understanding.

翻译：比喻语言对语言模型构成挑战，因其释义基于词语对常规顺序与意义的偏离。然而，人类能轻松理解隐喻、明喻或习语，因这些可从具身隐喻推导。语言是具身性的代理，若隐喻已习惯化且词汇化，无实体的系统也能理解具身概念。然而，在比喻语言理解语境下，具身性与具体性、习得年龄等特征间的复杂关系尚未针对语言模型进行研究。因此，本研究揭示：当比喻句的动作更具具身性时，较大语言模型在解释隐喻句方面表现更优。该分析排除了与其他特征（如词长或具体性）的多重共线性，并初步证明较大语言模型能在一定程度上概念化具身概念，从而促进比喻语言理解。