The generalizability of context effects on word recognition: A reconsideration of the roles of parafoveal priming and sentence context

In three experiments, subjects named target words preceded by congruous, incongruous, or neutral sentence contexts. There was no evidence that the recognition of the target word was affected by the semantic characteristics of a word presented immediately to the right of it. The nature of the preceding sentence context did affect target-naming speed. However, the magnitude of the context effect was considerably smaller in these experiments, in which nonterminal target words were used, than in previous experiments in which the target word was always the final word of the sentence, was highly predictable from the context, and was often semantically related to words in the sentence. The implications of these two findings for theories of reading and context effects are discussed.     

Repetition blindness and bilingual memory: Token individuation for translation equivalents

The repetition blindness effect (RB) occurs when individuals are unable to recall a repeated word relative to a nonrepeated word in a sentence or string of words presented in a rapid serial visual presentation task. This effect was explored across languages (English and Spanish) in an attempt to provide evidence for RB at a conceptual level using noncognate translation equivalents (e.g.,nephew-sobrino). In the first experiment, RB was found when a word was repeated in an English sentence but not when the two repetitions were in different languages. In the second experiment, RB was found for identical repetitions in Spanish and in English using word lists. However, the crosslanguage condition produced significant facilitation in recall, suggesting that although conceptual processing had taken place, semantic overlap was not sufficient to produce RB. The results confirm Kanwisher’s (1987) token individuation hypothesis in the case of translation equivalents.     

Sentence context modifies compound word recognition: Evidence from eye movements

Two eye movement experiments are reported that examine the influence of sentence context on morphological processing. English compound words which vary in beginning lexeme frequency (Experiment 1) and ending lexeme frequency (Experiment 2) were embedded into sentence contexts that were either predictive of the compound word or were neutral with respect to the compound. A predictable sentence context reduced the effect of beginning lexeme frequency on first fixation and single fixation durations. However, sentence context did not modify effects of beginning and ending lexeme frequency in later fixation measures. These results further support the theoretical position that morphology plays a role at multiple levels within readers' mental lexicons. In addition, these results suggest that access to early morpho-orthographic processes can be influenced by sentence context, a finding that suggests an interactive relationship between sentence context and word recognition.     

Expectancy,integration, and interactional processes: Age differences in the nature of words affected by sentence context

Two experiments investigated sentence context effects on the naming times of sentence completion words by third-grade children and college students. Across both experiments, the largest age difference in contextual facilitation was obtained for highly predictable, best completion words. Pronounced age differences in facilitation effects were also present for semantically acceptable target words which were much less predictable in the sentence context than the best completion words. However, age differences in contextual facilitation were negligible for target words which were associatively related to the best completion word, but which were not also semantically acceptable in the sentence context. Thus, the semantic acceptability of the word in the sentence context had a much greater influence on children's as compared to adults' word identification times, both when the word was highly predictable, as well as when it was much less predictable in the sentence context.     

The effects of root frequency, word frequency, and length on the processing of prefixed English words during reading

Two experiments were performed to investigate the roles of root morpheme frequency and word frequency in the encoding of prefixed words in sentence context. Two alternative words, which were equated on other indices but differed with respect to either root morpheme frequency or word frequency, were embedded in the same sentence frame. In Experiment 1, there was a significant root morpheme frequency effect on gaze duration but only a marginal word frequency effect. Post hoc analyses indicated that word length influenced both effects, with word frequency effects predominating for shorter words and root morpheme effects predominating for longer words. In Experiment 2, word length was also manipulated. There was a significant root frequency effect for longer prefixed words and a significant word frequency effect for shorter prefixed words. The results were best explained by a dual-route model (with competing whole-word access and compositional routes), in which increasing word length inhibited the whole-word process, relative to the compositional route.     

句子语境中语义联系启动作用的研究

通过对比研究正序和乱序两种句子语境对目标词加工的不同影响,来探讨句子语境中语义联系启动作用及作用点问题。实验一采用词汇命名任务研究发现,句法成分影响命名任务,句法违反对命名任务产生较大的抑制作用。语义违反则对命名任务没有产生显著的抑制作用。实验二利用词汇决定任务发现,词序影响决定任务,乱序对词汇决定产生很大的抑制作用。语义违反对决定任务地产生较大的抑制作用。结果表,中义联系启动是短暂的,它的保持和传递需要句法成分的支持。     

Word associations are formed incidentally during sentential semantic integration

Sentential context facilitates the incidental formation of word associations (e.g., Prior, A., & Bentin, S. (2003). Incidental formation of episodic associations: the importance of sentential context. Memory and Cognition, 31(2), 306-316). The present study explored the mechanism of this effect. In two experiments, unrelated word pairs were embedded in coherent or semantically anomalous sentences. Anomalous sentences included either a local or a global anomaly. During an incidental study phase, participants performed a sentence categorization task. The strength of the incidental associations formed between two nouns jointly appearing in a sentence was probed by gauging their influence on subsequent paired-associate learning and cued recall in Experiment 1, and by assessing their associative priming effect in a subsequent unexpected explicit recognition test for single words in Experiment 2. In both experiments, significant associative memory was found for noun pairs studied in coherent sentences but not for those appearing in anomalous sentences, regardless of anomaly type. In a sentence rating task, global anomalies yielded less plausible sentences than local anomalies, however both types of anomalies were equally detrimental to the sentence integration process. We suggest that sentence constituents are incidentally associated during sentence processing, particularly as a result of sentence integration and the consolidation of a mental model.     

Rapid extraction of gist from visual text and its influence on word recognition

Two experiments explored rapid extraction of gist from a visual text and its influence on word recognition. In both, a short text (sentence) containing a target word was presented for 200 ms and was followed by a target recognition task. Results showed that participants recognized contextually anomalous word targets less frequently than contextually consistent counterparts (Experiment 1). This context effect was obtained when sentences contained the same semantic content but with disrupted syntactic structure (Experiment 2). Results demonstrate that words in a briefly presented visual sentence are processed in parallel and that rapid extraction of sentence gist relies on a primitive representation of sentence context (termed protocontext) that is semantically activated by the simultaneous presentation of multiple words (i.e., a sentence) before syntactic processing.     

Use of semantic context by patients with Alzheimer's disease

In this study we used semantic-priming procedures to examine limitations in the use of semantic context by patients with Alzheimer's disease. We also tried to determine whether any such contextual effects were mediated solely through automatic processes or whether attentional processes were also involved. Three tasks were applied to examine the effect of semantic context on the performance of 18 normal elderly and 18 normal young subjects, and on 18 patients with Alzheimer's disease. When normal and demented subjects were asked to decide whether a given item was a member of a certain category, results showed that their response times were equally affected by the item's dominance in the category. The time that demented patients took to recognize a word was actually affected more by the semantic context provided by a priming sentence than was that of normal subjects. When asked to generate the final word of an incomplete sentence, demented subjects performed very poorly unless potential responses were highly constrained by sentence context.     

The interpretation of ambiguous trimorphemic words in sentence context

Many trimorphemic words are structurally and semantically ambiguous. For example, unlock-able can either be un-lockable (cannot be locked) or unlock-able (can be unlocked). Which interpretation is preferred and whether the preceding sentence context affects the initial interpretation is not clear from prior research. The present experiment embedded ambiguous trimorphemic words in sentence contexts, manipulated whether or not preceding context disambiguated the meaning, and examined the pattern of fixation durations on the ambiguous word and the remainder of the text. The results indicated that the unlock-able interpretation was preferred; moreover, preceding context did not exert a significant effect until the eyes had initially exited from the target word.     

句子阅读理解过程中句意的建构时间

一般语言学理论认为, 在句子阅读理解过程中, 句子意义建构是基于词汇语义整合的, 其反映在N400之上, 开始于词语呈现后约250 ms。然而, 近年关于语义P600效应的研究却提示句意建构可能存在多通道或方式, 读者甚至可能在N400反映的加工出现之前就已建立了初步句意。为探明在句子阅读理解过程中是否存在比N400反映的加工更早的句意建构, 以及如果存在这样的句意建构, 其是从何时开始的, 本研究开展了四个实验。实验1发现被试在句末双字词呈现200 ms后已将其联系到上文语义表征而建立了句意, 提示句意建构开始于N400反映的加工出现之前。实验2与3进一步发现, 读者开始建立句意的时间约在句末词呈现了150 ms之时。实验4排除了实验1~3效应的其他一些可能解释, 提升了实验1~3结果的可靠性。总体上, 本研究提示：在句子阅读理解过程中, 读者在句末双字词呈现了约150 ms之时就已建立了句意; 可能存在比N400反映的加工更早的句意建构。     

句子语境中语义联系效应和句法效应的研究

通过对比研究句子语境中句法成分和语义联系对目标词加工的不同影响,来探讨句子语境的作用机制和作用点问题。实验一采用词汇命名任务研究发现,句法违反对词汇命名会产生抑制作用,而语义违反对词汇命名却没有发现抑制作用。实验二利用词汇决定任务发现,句法和语义成分影响词汇决定任务,句法违反和语义违反对词汇决定任务均会产生抑制作用。结果表明,句子语境加工中,对内容词语义整合过程中存在一个句法成分的独立加工水平。     

The maze task: Measuring forced incremental sentence processing time

The maze task is an online measure of sentence processing time that provides an alternative to the standard moving window version of self-paced reading. Rather than each word of the sentence being presented in succession, two words are presented at the same time, and the participant must choose which word is a grammatical continuation of the sentence. This procedure forces the reader into an incremental mode of processing in which each word must be fully integrated with the preceding context before the next word can be considered. Previous research with this technique has not considered whether it is sufficiently sensitive to syntactic complexity effects or to garden path effects. Four experiments are reported demonstrating that reliable differences in processing time for subject relatives and object relatives can be obtained, and that this technique generates garden path effects that correspond closely with the data from eyetracking experiments, but without the spillover effects that are sometimes obtained with eyetracking. It is also shown that the task is sensitive to word frequency effects, producing estimates well in excess of those found with eyetracking.     

Sentence context modulates visual word recognition and translation in bilinguals

The influence of sentence context constraint on subsequent processing of concrete and abstract cognates and noncognates was tested in three experiments. Target words were preceded by a predictive, high constraint sentence context, by a congruent, low constraint sentence context, or were presented in isolation. Dutch-English bilinguals performed lexical decision in their second language (L2), or translated target words in forward (from L1 to L2) or in backward (from L2 to L1) direction. After reading a high constraint sentence context, cognate and concreteness effects disappeared in lexical decision and strongly decreased in both translation tasks. In contrast, low constraint sentences did not influence cognate and concreteness effects. These results suggest that semantically rich sentences modulate cross-language interaction during word recognition and word translation.     

Age-related differences in semantic priming: evidence from event-related brain potentials

Hasher and Zacks (1988) suggested that aging may affect processes involved in the inhibition of irrelevant information during language processing. Our experiment tested this hypothesis using the N400 event-related brain potential in a priming paradigm and assessed whether older subjects could benefit from the constraints of a sentence context. Twenty older (63 to 88 years) and 20 young (19 to 29 years) subjects read sentences and word pairs. Each final word varied on the degree of relatedness to the preceding context, with some being highly related (BC), moderately related (R), or unrelated (U). Younger subjects showed the expected N400 effect gradient (U > R > BC) in both the sentence and word-pair contexts, while older adults showed no discrimination between the conditions (U = R = BC) for the sentence and limited discrimination (U > BC) for the word pairs. These results support the inhibition-deficit hypothesis, whereby older adults fail to inhibit related items in working memory, and suggest that older adults do not benefit from the constraints of a sentence context.     

The effects of processing requirements on neurophysiological responses to spoken sentences

Ten English speaking subjects listened to sentences that varied in sentential constraint (i.e., the degree to which the context of a sentence predicts the final word of that sentence) and event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded during the presentation of the final word of each sentence. In the Control condition subjects merely listened to the sentences. In the Orthographic processing condition subjects merely listened to the sentences. In the Orthographic processing condition subjects decided, following each sentence, whether a given letter had been present in the final word of the preceding sentence. In the Phonological processing condition the subjects judged whether a given speech sound was contained in the terminal word. In the Semantic processing condition subjects determined whether the final word was a member of a given semantic category. A previous finding in the visual modality that the N400 component was larger in amplitude for low constraint sentence terminations than for high was extended to the auditory modality. It was also found that the amplitude of a N200-like response was similarly responsive to contextual constraint. The hypothesis that N400 amplitude would vary significantly with the depth of processing of the terminal word was not supported by the data. The "N200" recorded in this language processing context showed the classic frontocentral distribution of the N200. The N400 to spoken sentences had a central/centroparietal distribution similar to the N400 in visual modality experiments. It is suggested that the N400 obtained in these sentence contexts reflects an automatic semantic processing of words that occurs even when semantic analysis is not required to complete a given task. The cooccurrence and topographical dissimilarity of the "N200" and N400 suggest that the N400 may not be a delayed or a generic N200.     

On-line predictive inferences in reading: Processing timeduring versusafter the priming context

Prior research suggests that predictive inferences take time to construct on-line. The present study examines the relative contribution of time available during and after reading an inducing context. In six experiments, we manipulated the presentation rate of the context and the delay between the onset of the last word in the context and a target word. A predicting, or a control, sentence context was followed by a target word, which represented the predicted event or an unlikely event. The results indicated that increasing the time available during reading of the context improved comprehension of explicit information, but it did not affect construction of inferences. In contrast, increasing the delay at the end of the context did not affect explicit comprehension, but it enhanced the probability of inferences, as revealed by shorter latencies in naming the predictable target word after the inducing context, relative to the control context. These findings show that readers defer making predictive inferences until 1 sec after the sentence context has been read, regardless of the time available when they are processing the context.     

Vertical similarity in spoken word recognition: Multiple lexical activation,individual differences,and the role of sentence context

Four experiments investigated acoustic-phonetic similarity in the mapping process between the speech signal and lexical representations (vertical similarity). Auditory stimuli were used where ambiguous initial phonemes rendered a phoneme sequence lexically ambiguous (perceptual-lexical ambiguities). A cross-modal priming paradigm (Experiments 1, 2, and 3) showed facilitation for targets related to both interpretations of the ambiguities, indicating multiple activation. Experiment 4 investigated individual differences and the role of sentence context in vertical similarity mapping. The results support a model where spoken word recognition proceeds via goodness-of-fit mapping between speech and lexical representations that is not influenced by sentence context.     

Repetition blindness in sentence contexts: Not just an attribution?

Selective "blindness" to repeated words in rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) occurs even when omitting these words compromises sentence syntax and meaning. The contributions of lexical and contextual factors to this repetition blindness (RB) phenomenon were evaluated using three tasks that combined RB and ambiguity resolution paradigms. During an RSVP sentence, a repeated word and matched but incongruous control were presented simultaneously, and participants were asked to report the entire sentence, including only the appropriate word. Substantial RB was evident in impaired report of repeated targets, whereas report of nonrepeated targets was enhanced when the distractor was a repeat. Experiment 2 confirmed these results with reduced reporting requirements, and Experiment 3 demonstrated the independence of repetition and sentence congruity effects. Results across all contexts support a lexical account of RB, which assumes that reactivation and identification of rapidly repeated words are impaired due to the refractory nature of lexical representations.     

The interaction of sentence context and perceptual analysis in word identification

The influence of sentence context on word identification has, in some interactive models, been attributed to enhanced accuracy or speed of perceptual analysis. This view is challenged by two experiments in which contextually enhanced word identification was found only when a target’s relevance to the sentence context was correlated with its presence. When this constraint was removed by using contextually relevant foils, accuracy in detecting words in normal and scrambled sentences did not differ reliably. Moreover, under conditions that constituted a negative correlation between target relevance and presence, word identification was more accurate with scrambled than with normal sentences. These results are consistent with models of sentence context effects that are based on the assumptions that (1) perceptual analysis proceeds independently of contextual analysis, and (2) the results of these analyses are integrated to determine a word’s identity.