Event-related potential indicators of text integration across sentence boundaries.

Abstract

An event-related potentials (ERPs) study examined word-to-text integration processes across sentence boundaries. In a two-sentence passage, the accessibility of a referent for the first content word of the second sentence (the target word) was varied by the wording of the first sentence in one of the following ways: lexically (explicitly using a form of the target word); conceptually (using a paraphrase of the target word), and situationally (encouraging an inference concerning the referent of the target word). A baseline condition had no coreference between the two sentences. ERP results on the target word indicated multiple effects related to word identification and word-to-referent mapping processes. Both the explicit and paraphrase conditions, but not the inference condition, showed a reduced N400 relative to the baseline condition, consistent with immediate integration by lexico-semantic processes. A 300-ms effect (P300) was found in the paraphrase condition. The results were consistent with an immediate integration hypothesis and furthermore differentiated a lexical (N200), a conceptual (P300), and a situational (N400) component for this integration. The conceptual basis appears not to extend to predictive inferences.

Comprehension skill and word‐to‐text integration processes

“…In the first study (Yang et al, 2007), the focus was on the basic questions of text integration and whether ERPs would provide evidence that integration occurred immediately even across a sentence boundary. Accordingly, the participants were a group of skilled comprehenders from a university population, mean age 18.5.…”

Integrative and predictive processes in text reading: the N400 across a sentence boundary

“…Bridging inferences are especially necessary when an antecedent is absent, resulting in no explicit connection between referent and prior text information. Take the following sentences from Yang et al (2007) as an example.…”

“…one must make a bridging inference and infer the relationship between explosion and the bomb hitting the ground, because no clear antecedent in the first sentence exists. Yang et al (2007) tested the hypothesis that readers have increased processing for words that do not have an obvious relationship to a previous context. They used the N400 as index of integration difficulty.…”

“…The paradigm was identical to the Yang et al (2007) paradigm, and experimenters manipulated the direction of lexical associations between the final word of the first sentence and the first content word of the second sentence. A strong association from word A to word B indicates a FA.…”

“…Two hundred and nine sentence pairs were adapted from the Stafura et al (2015) and Yang et al (2007) studies. The first sentence of each sentence pair and first word from the second sentence were used (e.g., After drawing five cards from the deck, Sebastian cautiously laid down his money.…”