Linguistic Memory Representations: ERPs and Eye Tracking

描述（由申请人提供）：对指称和共指表达的理解是体现一个句子或一系列句子的含义的话语模型的心理构建的重要部分。在语篇模式中，正确理解指称（共）是整合和区分意义的基础，它是将指称同一实体的不同表达方式的特征和行为整合在一起的基础，同时也是区分不同表达方式的特征和行为的基础。为了发挥作用，共指处理机制必须与涉及词汇处理的基本记忆过程相互作用。长期以来，词汇记忆过程的研究一直采用重复启动和语义启动的方法，以了解词汇加工的基本情节和语义特征;这项工作为许多公认的认知加工机制提供了基础。然而，对指称和共指的正确解释对信息处理的要求与处理孤立词或词列表的要求非常不同。目前的项目研究语言理解如何使用，并在某些情况下覆盖，词汇处理的基本机制。该项目有五个具体目标：（1）考察共指表达的记忆整合，（2）比较结构化语言和词表中的记忆整合，（3）考察由范畴词组成的共指表达的记忆整合，（4）考察语言焦点的性质及其与其他注意的关系，（5）探讨右半球在共指加工中的作用。在整个拟议的研究中，在阅读过程中结合使用眼动追踪和ERP将提供参与语言理解的认知和神经过程的补充措施。由于语言是一个基本的认知过程，阐明基本的语言机制仍然是一个高度优先的努力，以理解，诊断和治疗发展和后天语言障碍。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The understanding of referential and coreferential expressions is an essential part of the mental construction of a discourse model that embodies the meaning of a sentence or a series of sentences. Correct understanding of (co) reference is essential both to integrating and differentiating meaning in a discourse model; it is the basis by which the characteristics and actions associated with different expressions that refer to the same entity are integrated together and by which they are simultaneously differentiated from the characteristics and actions associated with different entities mentioned in the text. In order to do their work, the mechanisms of coreferential processing must interact with basic memory processes that are involved in the processing of words. Research on lexical memory processes has for a long time used repetition priming and semantic priming in order to understand basic episodic and semantic characteristics of word processing; this work has provided the basis for many commonly accepted mechanisms of cognitive processing. However, the correct interpretation of reference and coreference places very different demands on information processing from those that arise in the processing isolated words or lists of words. The current project examines how language comprehension uses, and in some cases overrides, basic mechanisms of lexical processing. The project addresses five specific aims: (1) to investigate memory integration of coreferential expressions, (2) to compare memory integration in structured language and word lists, (3) to investigate memory integration of coreferential expressions consisting of category terms, (4) to investigate the nature of linguistic focus and its relation to other kinds of attention, and (5) to investigate the role of the right hemisphere in coreferential processing. Throughout the proposed research, the combined use of eye tracking and ERPs during reading will provide complementary measures of the cognitive and neural processes involved in language comprehension. Because language is an essential cognitive process, elucidating basic language mechanisms remains a high priority in the effort to understand, diagnose and treat developmental and acquired language impairments.