Early semantic context integration and lexical access as revealed by event-related brain potentials. Export

@article{citeulike:1178458, abstract = {A late neurophysiological response, the N400, is well known to reflect word processing and semantic context integration. Nevertheless, behavioural and neurophysiological data have demonstrated that word features and semantic sentence context influence linguistic processes already within the first 200ms following the onset of the critical word stimulus. The lack of early word-related ERP effects in some studies might be due to large stimulus variance on relevant linguistic parameters, for example the length of written words or their frequency of usage. Here we investigated the effect of the length of words, their standardized lexical frequency and probability to occur in a given semantic context, by orthogonally varying these factors in a sentence-reading task. We found word frequency and probability to be reflected neurophysiologically already at 120 and 180ms after written word onset. However, at these early stages frequency and probability effects were modulated by word length, as documented by significant interactions, whereas at later stages, around 300-500ms, additive effects of these variables were found. These results indicate that semantic context integration may take place at a surprisingly early stage and near-simultaneously with the processing of information about the form of a word and its lexical properties, therefore challenging serial models of psycholinguistic information access. A methodological implication of this study is that, in order to obtain early psycholinguistic ERP effects, stimulus variance must be kept to a minimum.}, address = {Medical Research Council, Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge CB2 7EF, UK; Department of General Psychology, University of Padova, Via Venezia 8, 35131 Padova, Italy.}, author = {Penolazzi, B. and Hauk, O. and Pulverm\"{u}ller, F.}, citeulike-article-id = {1178458}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2006.09.008}, citeulike-linkout-1 = {http://view.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17150298}, citeulike-linkout-2 = {http://www.hubmed.org/display.cgi?uids=17150298}, doi = {10.1016/j.biopsycho.2006.09.008}, issn = {0301-0511}, journal = {Biol Psychol}, keywords = {erps, n400, semantic}, month = {March}, number = {3}, pages = {374--388}, posted-at = {2009-11-07 20:40:36}, priority = {2}, title = {Early semantic context integration and lexical access as revealed by event-related brain potentials.}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2006.09.008}, volume = {74}, year = {2007} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:1178458 L3 - citeulike-article-id:1178458 N2 - A late neurophysiological response, the N400, is well known to reflect word processing and semantic context integration. Nevertheless, behavioural and neurophysiological data have demonstrated that word features and semantic sentence context influence linguistic processes already within the first 200ms following the onset of the critical word stimulus. The lack of early word-related ERP effects in some studies might be due to large stimulus variance on relevant linguistic parameters, for example the length of written words or their frequency of usage. Here we investigated the effect of the length of words, their standardized lexical frequency and probability to occur in a given semantic context, by orthogonally varying these factors in a sentence-reading task. We found word frequency and probability to be reflected neurophysiologically already at 120 and 180ms after written word onset. However, at these early stages frequency and probability effects were modulated by word length, as documented by significant interactions, whereas at later stages, around 300-500ms, additive effects of these variables were found. These results indicate that semantic context integration may take place at a surprisingly early stage and near-simultaneously with the processing of information about the form of a word and its lexical properties, therefore challenging serial models of psycholinguistic information access. A methodological implication of this study is that, in order to obtain early psycholinguistic ERP effects, stimulus variance must be kept to a minimum. IS - 3 JF - Biol Psychol SN - 0301-0511 AD - Medical Research Council, Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge CB2 7EF, UK; Department of General Psychology, University of Padova, Via Venezia 8, 35131 Padova, Italy. EP - 388 TI - Early semantic context integration and lexical access as revealed by event-related brain potentials. VL - 74 SP - 374 KW - erps KW - n400 KW - semantic AU - Penolazzi, B AU - Hauk, O AU - Pulvermüller, F PY - 2007/03// UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2006.09.008 ER -