近年來有許多從認知語言角度探討經濟用語的相關研究。然而很少文獻探討從 「貧窮」這個概念衍伸出來的三個類同義詞─「貧」，「窮」和「貧窮」。因此本文以動態語法 (Emergent grammar, Hopper, 1987)，動詞及物性理論 (Transitivity theory, Halliday, 1985) 及本體論 (Suggested Upper Merged Ontology, Niles & Pease, 2001) 為理論架構，研究華語經濟用語「貧窮」及其類同義詞「貧」與「窮」的用法。研究旨在探討華語中理解「貧窮」、「貧」與「窮」的及物性過程。所謂的及物性過程，即是人類將他們與現實環境的互動分成若干過程來探討語義概念的一種系統。其在動態語法，也就是當語言被使用時，語法結構才會浮現下的闡釋以及華語母語使用者對貧窮，缺乏錢財，生活拮据困乏這個概念的認知思維。
研究結果顯示：(1) 「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」雖同源自一概念，然其動詞及物性過程並不相同；也就是說「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」這三個類同義詞在人們的語義理解過程中有些差異。即，貧窮這一複合詞主要分布在物質過程，也就是做某一件事的過程較多。例如在『協助弱勢兒童與家庭脫離貧窮』這一例子中，貧窮被視為人類想要具體擺脫處理的事務。至於「貧」與「窮」這兩個單詞則主要用在描述事物之間彼此相互關聯的關係過程如『嚴格來說，中央與地方都很窮』。(2) 「貧窮」的動詞及物性分類為現實取向，例如:『所以近年世界經濟發展的目標，漸從重視降低所得分配不均轉向減少貧窮』便是著重於反應現實世界中發生的種種人事時地物。另一方面，「貧」與「窮」則為功能取向，辨別其他事物與「貧」、「窮」間的關係。如『最下層是失業或只能打工的貧民』強調失業或是只能打工的貧民是在社會階層的分類是屬於最下層的。(3) 雖然金融風暴前後，關於貧窮的三個類同義詞，在動詞及物性的六種過程分類排序都相同。然而，根據收集的語料發現，金融風暴爆發後，在物質過程的例子數目減少，但在心理過程、關係過程、言語過程及存在過程的例子則呈現增加的狀態。語意韻律，也就是詞語間的排列組合呈現否定，隱藏負面的言外之意傾向。(4) 語意偏好決定了「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」的差別。雖然「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」為類同義詞，但普遍選擇擁有多樣的語法功能的單詞「窮」來描敘人類處於貧窮的情勢。(5) 華語母語使用者的文化價值反映在本體論上。「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」雖可分類為不同的動詞及物性種類，但在本體論上卻歸為過程、實質、基礎及程序這四類。
總之，藉由研究從同一經濟概念延伸出來的「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」的譬喻用法，我們發現雖然此三種經濟用語為類同義詞，但在動態語法下卻有不同的譬喻特徵和及物性過程。也就是說在華語母語使用者的心中對「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」的感知並不相同。「貧」、「窮」與「貧窮」隱含的本體論顯示出華語母語使用者的認知思維與文化如何影響「貧窮」這一概念的闡釋。換句話說，人類將貧窮歸為一個負面的基礎概念，為了要擺脫這種不符社會大眾期待的情形，人類會試著採取不同的步驟來處理這情況。

In recent years, there has been much related research concerned with financial expressions discussed from a cognitive linguistic perspective. However, little research has been done on pin2 qiong2 貧窮 ‘poor’, pin2 貧 ‘poor’ and qiong2 窮 ‘poor’, three economic related quasi-synonyms, which are derived from the same concept of ‘poverty’. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to explore how Mandarin Chinese native speakers conceptualize the notion of impoverishment. This thesis involves a corpus-based approach and a framework which is comprised of Hopper’s (1987) emergent grammar, Halliday’s (1985) transitivity theory and Niles & Pease’s (2001) Suggested Upper Merged Ontology (SUMO). We aim at discovering (1) whether pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2 have similar or different processes of transitivity, (2) how Mandarin Chinese native speakers evaluate pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2 from an emergent perspective, and (3) the cognition or economic reactions that occur in the realizations and interpretations of pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2.
Our results show: (1) pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2 involve different transitive processes. Pin2 qiong2 is widely distributed in the material process. This refers to the process by which people interact with things surrounding them e.g., tuo1 li2 pin2 qiong2 脫離貧窮 ‘get rid of poverty’. Pin2 qiong2 is considered to be a concrete negative financial status people try to free themselves from. Most of the data concerning pin2 and qiong2 are in the relational process, e.g., yan2 ge2 lai2 shuo1 zhong1 yang1 yu3 di4 fang1 dou1 hen3 qiong2 嚴格來說，中央與地方都很窮 ‘strictly speaking, the central and the local governments both are very poor’ which is used to describe the interrelationship between the central and the local governments. (2) The classification of pin2 qiong2 is reality-orientated, e.g., suo3 yi3 jin4 nian2 lai2 shi4 jie4 jing1 ji4 fa1 zhan3 de mu4 biao1 jian4 cong2 zhong4 shi4 jiang4 di1 suo3 de2 fen1 pei4 bu4 jun1 zhuan3 xiang4 jian3 shao3 pin2 qiong2 所以近年來世界經濟發展的目標，漸從重視降低所得分配不均轉向減少貧窮 ‘Therefore, recently, the goal of worldwide economic development has been gradually changing from focusing on lowering the uneven income distribution to focusing on decreasing poverty’ which emphasizes what happens in the real world. On the other hand, pin2 and qiong2 are function-oriented, e.g., zui4 xia4 ceng2 shi4 shi1 ye4 huo4 zhi3 neng2 da3 gong1 de pin2 min2 最下層是失業或只能打工的貧民 ‘people who are jobless or poor people who only can do part-time job belong to the lowest class’ to show what kind of people are classified into the lowest class in the society. (3) Whether during the period before or after the financial crisis, the ranking of collected data in each process is the same, that is to say, the way three economic quasi-synonyms are distributed in six various transitive processes is not different. However, after the boom of the economic depression, the number of examples assigned to the material process drops while the number of examples in the remaining four processes rises and more negative semantic prosody is presented. This phenomenon appears to be consistent with the emergent grammar. (4) Linguistic preference is crucial in describing pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2, that is, different collocations characterize them. For example, qiong2 which has various grammatical functions is widely accepted as a lexeme to describe people’s impoverished situation than pin2 or pin2 qiong2. (5) Mandarin Chinese native speakers’ economic reactions are transpired by means of philosophical ontology. The results show that these quasi-synonyms are classified into the ontology of process, quality, base and procedure no matter how different transitive processes they have.
To conclude, pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2 are derived from the same economic concept of ‘poverty’, but they have different metaphorical characteristics. In addition, the ontology behind pin2 qiong2, pin2 and qiong2 conveys how Mandarin Chinese native speakers’ perception and economic reactions influences the interpretation of the idea of ‘poverty’. In other words, people conceptualize the idea as a basic element which is attached with a negative quality. As a result, in order to get rid of this situation, people try to adopt different procedures to cope with this process of poverty.

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