Electrophysiological distinctions in processing conceptual relationships within simple sentences
Electrophysiological distinctions in processing conceptual relationships within simple sentences
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DOI：
10.1016/s0926-6410(03)00086-7
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发表时间：
2003-06-01
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影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Holcomb, PJ
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文献类型：
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作者：
Kuperberg, GR;Sitnikova, T;Holcomb, PJ
本研究的目的是确定大脑在在线处理简单、明确的英语句子时是否能够区分名词短语 (NP) 和动词之间的两种概念关系。共有 15 名参与者逐字阅读句子并做出合理性判断。测量了关键动词引发的事件相关电位。在所有情况下，关键动词都为其主语 NP 分配了“施动者”的主题角色。在非违规句子中（例如“For breakfast the girls will only eat...”），前面的 NP 是有生命的（“boys”），并且考虑到其前面的上下文（“For breakfast”），它是给定动词（“eat”）的可能代理。在这两种类型的概念违规句子中，鉴于其先前的上下文，NP 不太可能是动词的代理。在“主题角色生命性侵犯”中（例如“早餐时鸡蛋只会吃……”），NP 是无生命的（“鸡蛋”），因此更有可能占据“主题”的角色而不是“代理”的角色，即鸡蛋是无生命的，不能吃，但可以吃。在“非主题角色语用违规”中（例如“对于早餐，男孩只会埋葬……”），由动词（“埋葬”）分配给其前面的 NP（“男孩”）的主体主题角色本质上是可以接受的（男孩可以埋葬），但考虑到前面的上下文（“在早餐时”），该句子在语用上仍然不协调。正如预期的那样，非主题角色的务实违规引发了显着的 N400 效应。主题角色的生命力违规引发了较小的 N400 效应，仅在所有参与者中达到显着性。然而，主题角色生命力的侵犯引发了显着的 P600 效应——ERP 组件，最常与语言理解过程中处理句法信息相关。我们讨论了 P600 是由主题角色生命力违规引发的可能性（而不是由非主题角色语用违规引发），因为在前者中，但在后者中，有人在线尝试通过将关键动词之前的 NP 的主题角色从“主体”重新分配为“主题”来结构修复和理解句子。我们的研究结果表明，在简单、明确的句子中处理这两类概念异常时存在定性的神经差异。 (C) 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. 保留所有权利。
The aim of this study was to determine whether or not the brain distinguishes between two types of conceptual relationships between noun-phrases (NPs) and verbs during online processing of simple, unambiguous English sentences. A total of 15 participants read and made plausibility judgments on sentences that were presented word-by-word. Event-related potentials elicited by critical verbs were measured. In all cases, the critical verb assigned a thematic role of 'agent' to its subject NP. In non-violated sentences (e.g. "For breakfast the boys would only eat... "), the preceding NP was animate ("boys") and was a likely agent for a given verb ("eat") given its preceding context ("For breakfast"). In both types of conceptually violated sentences, the NPs were unlikely agents for the verbs given their preceding contexts. In 'thematic role animacy violations' (e.g. "For breakfast the eggs would only eat... "), the NP was inanimate ("eggs") and was therefore more likely to occupy the role of 'theme' than 'agent', i.e. eggs, being inanimate, cannot eat but they can be eaten. In 'non-thematic role pragmatic violations' (e.g. "For breakfast the boys would only bury... "), the thematic role of agent assigned by the verb ("bury") to its preceding NP ("boys") is inherently acceptable (boys can bury), but the sentence is still pragmatically incongruous given the preceding context ("At breakfast"). As expected, the non-thematic role pragmatic violations elicited a significant N400 effect. The thematic role animacy violations elicited a smaller N400 effect that only approached significance across all participants. The thematic role animacy violations, however, elicited a significant P600 effect-an ERP component that is most commonly associated with processing syntactic information during language comprehension. We discuss the possibility that the P600 was elicited by the thematic role animacy violations (but not by the non-thematic role pragmatic violations) because, in the former but not the latter, there was an online attempt to structurally repair and make sense of the sentences by reassigning the thematic role of the NP that preceded the critical verb from 'agent' to 'theme'. Our findings suggest a qualitative neural distinction in processing these two types of conceptual anomalies within simple, unambiguous sentences. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.