scholarly journals The Neural Time Course of Semantic Ambiguity Resolution in Speech Comprehension

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 403-425 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucy J. MacGregor ◽  
Jennifer M. Rodd ◽  
Rebecca A. Gilbert ◽  
Olaf Hauk ◽  
Ediz Sohoglu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ambiguity Resolution ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Neural Response ◽  
Semantic Integration ◽  
Speech Comprehension ◽  
Semantic Ambiguity ◽  
Positive Correlation ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Subordinate Meaning

Semantically ambiguous words challenge speech comprehension, particularly when listeners must select a less frequent (subordinate) meaning at disambiguation. Using combined magnetoencephalography (MEG) and EEG, we measured neural responses associated with distinct cognitive operations during semantic ambiguity resolution in spoken sentences: (i) initial activation and selection of meanings in response to an ambiguous word and (ii) sentence reinterpretation in response to subsequent disambiguation to a subordinate meaning. Ambiguous words elicited an increased neural response approximately 400–800 msec after their acoustic offset compared with unambiguous control words in left frontotemporal MEG sensors, corresponding to sources in bilateral frontotemporal brain regions. This response may reflect increased demands on processes by which multiple alternative meanings are activated and maintained until later selection. Disambiguating words heard after an ambiguous word were associated with marginally increased neural activity over bilateral temporal MEG sensors and a central cluster of EEG electrodes, which localized to similar bilateral frontal and left temporal regions. This later neural response may reflect effortful semantic integration or elicitation of prediction errors that guide reinterpretation of previously selected word meanings. Across participants, the amplitude of the ambiguity response showed a marginal positive correlation with comprehension scores, suggesting that sentence comprehension benefits from additional processing around the time of an ambiguous word. Better comprehenders may have increased availability of subordinate meanings, perhaps due to higher quality lexical representations and reflected in a positive correlation between vocabulary size and comprehension success.

scholarly journals The relationship between sentence comprehension and lexical-semantic retuning

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Anne Gilbert ◽  
Matthew H. Davis ◽  
M. Gareth Gaskell ◽  
Jennifer M Rodd
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Lexical Semantic ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Subordinate Meaning ◽  
Final Interpretation ◽  
The Relationship

A single encounter with an ambiguous word (e.g. bark, ball) in the context of a less-frequent meaning (e.g. “Sally worried about how crowded the ball would be.”) can shift the later interpretation of the word toward the same subordinate meaning. This lexical-semantic retuning functions to improve future comprehension of ambiguous words. The present paper investigates the relationship between this form of learning and the specific processes that occur during sentence comprehension. One possibility is that lexical-semantic retuning occurs immediately upon hearing the ambiguous word, during initial meaning activation and selection, so priming should be strongest when the disambiguating context is provided before the ambiguous word (prior disambiguation). Alternatively, priming may relate to the degree of reinterpretation needed, which would predict maximal learning when the word is initially misunderstood because the critical context is given after the word (subsequent disambiguation, e.g. “Sally worried that the ball would be too crowded.”). In four experiments, adults listened to prior and subsequent disambiguation sentences, and were later tested on their interpretations of primed and unprimed ambiguous words. The results showed that lexical-semantic retuning can occur for both sentence types. Importantly, however, the emergence of priming for subsequent disambiguation sentences was sensitive to the prime conditions: when the task could potentially be performed without needing to re-analyse the ambiguity, then no significant priming was observed. This is consistent with the ‘good enough’ view of language processing which states that representations can remain as (im)precise as mandated by the situation, and that lexical-semantic retuning operates on the output of good-enough interpretation. More generally, our findings suggest that lexical-semantic retuning is driven by participants’ final interpretation of the word meanings during the prime encounter, regardless of initial meaning activation or misinterpretation.

Emotionality effects in ambiguous word recognition: The crucial role of the affective congruence between distinct meanings of ambiguous words

2021 ◽  
pp. 174702182199000
Author(s):  
Pilar Ferré ◽  
Juan Haro ◽  
Daniel Huete-Pérez ◽  
Isabel Fraga
Keyword(s):  
Word Processing ◽  
Reaction Times ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Semantic Ambiguity ◽  
Negative Valence ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Positive Valence ◽  
Affective Meanings ◽  
Valence Effect ◽  
Affective Word

There is substantial evidence that affectively charged words (e.g., party or gun) are processed differently from neutral words (e.g., pen), although there are also inconsistent findings in the field. Some lexical or semantic variables might explain such inconsistencies, due to the possible modulation of affective word processing by these variables. The aim of the present study was to examine the extent to which affective word processing is modulated by semantic ambiguity. We conducted a large lexical decision study including semantically ambiguous words (e.g., cataract) and semantically unambiguous words (e.g., terrorism), analysing the extent to which reaction times (RTs) were influenced by their affective properties. The findings revealed a valence effect in which positive valence made RTs faster, whereas negative valence slowed them. The valence effect diminished as the semantic ambiguity of words increased. This decrease did not affect all ambiguous words, but was observed mainly in ambiguous words with incongruent affective meanings. These results highlight the need to consider the affective properties of the distinct meanings of ambiguous words in research on affective word processing.

Semantic ambiguity norms for 530 Spanish words

2016 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 457-475 ◽  
Author(s):  
JUAN HARO ◽  
PILAR FERRÉ ◽  
ROGER BOADA ◽  
JOSEP DEMESTRE
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Age Of Acquisition ◽  
Emotional Valence ◽  
Objective Measures ◽  
Semantic Ambiguity ◽  
Subjective Ratings ◽  
Subjective Measures ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Ambiguous Words

ABSTRACTThis study presents semantic ambiguity norms for 530 Spanish words. Two subjective measures of semantic ambiguity and two subjective measures of relatedness of ambiguous word meanings were collected. In addition, two objective measures of semantic ambiguity were included. Furthermore, subjective ratings were obtained for some relevant lexicosemantic variables, such as concreteness, familiarity, emotional valence, arousal, and age of acquisition. In sum, the database overcomes some of the limitations of the published databases of Spanish ambiguous words; in particular, the scarcity of measures of ambiguity, the lack of relatedness of ambiguous word meanings measures, and the absence of a set of unambiguous words. Thus, it will be very helpful for researchers interested in exploring semantic ambiguity as well as for those using semantic ambiguous words to study language processing in clinical populations.

scholarly journals Pupil Dilation Is Sensitive to Semantic Ambiguity and Acoustic Degradation

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 233121652096406
Author(s):  
Mason Kadem ◽  
Björn Herrmann ◽  
Jennifer M. Rodd ◽  
Ingrid S. Johnsrude
Keyword(s):  
Signal To Noise Ratio ◽  
Cognitive Demand ◽  
Semantic Relatedness ◽  
Pupil Dilation ◽  
Probe Word ◽  
Speech Comprehension ◽  
Semantic Ambiguity ◽  
Visual Probe ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Noisy Background

Speech comprehension is challenged by background noise, acoustic interference, and linguistic factors, such as the presence of words with more than one meaning (homonyms and homophones). Previous work suggests that homophony in spoken language increases cognitive demand. Here, we measured pupil dilation—a physiological index of cognitive demand—while listeners heard high-ambiguity sentences, containing words with more than one meaning, or well-matched low-ambiguity sentences without ambiguous words. This semantic-ambiguity manipulation was crossed with an acoustic manipulation in two experiments. In Experiment 1, sentences were masked with 30-talker babble at 0 and +6 dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), and in Experiment 2, sentences were heard with or without a pink noise masker at –2 dB SNR. Speech comprehension was measured by asking listeners to judge the semantic relatedness of a visual probe word to the previous sentence. In both experiments, comprehension was lower for high- than for low-ambiguity sentences when SNRs were low. Pupils dilated more when sentences included ambiguous words, even when no noise was added (Experiment 2). Pupil also dilated more when SNRs were low. The effect of masking was larger than the effect of ambiguity for performance and pupil responses. This work demonstrates that the presence of homophones, a condition that is ubiquitous in natural language, increases cognitive demand and reduces intelligibility of speech heard with a noisy background.

The Effect of Meaning Frequency on Processing Lexically Ambiguous Words: Evidence from Eye Fixations

1992 ◽  
Vol 3 (5) ◽  
pp. 296-301 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara C Sereno ◽  
Jeremy M Pacht ◽  
Keith Rayner
Keyword(s):  
High Frequency ◽  
Frequency Control ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Prior Context ◽  
Eye Fixations ◽  
Lexical Ambiguity Resolution ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Subordinate Meaning ◽  
Meaning Frequency

Subjects read sentences containing lexically ambiguous words while their eye movements were monitored Biased ambiguous words (those that have one highly dominant sense) were used in sentences containing a prior context that instantiated their subordinate sense Control words were matched in frequency both to the dominant and to the subordinate meaning of the ambiguous word (high- and low-frequency controls) Subjects fixated longer on both the ambiguous word and the low-frequency control than on the high-frequency control When the target was ambiguous, however, the duration of posttarget fixations was longer and the likelihood of making a regression to the target was greater than when the target was an unambiguous control The results are discussed in relation to current models of lexical ambiguity resolution

scholarly journals Neural Correlates of Semantic Competition during Processing of Ambiguous Words

2009 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 960-975 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natalia Y. Bilenko ◽  
Christopher M. Grindrod ◽  
Emily B. Myers ◽  
Sheila E. Blumstein
Keyword(s):  
Inferior Frontal Gyrus ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Semantic Content ◽  
Neural Correlates ◽  
Auditory Modality ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Semantic Competition ◽  
Subordinate Meaning ◽  
Prime Target ◽  
Selection Of

The current study investigated the neural correlates that underlie the processing of ambiguous words and the potential effects of semantic competition on that processing. Participants performed speeded lexical decisions on semantically related and unrelated prime–target pairs presented in the auditory modality. The primes were either ambiguous words (e.g., ball) or unambiguous words (e.g., athlete), and targets were either semantically related to the dominant (i.e., most frequent) meaning of the ambiguous prime word (e.g., soccer) or to the subordinate (i.e., less frequent) meaning (e.g., dance). Results showed increased activation in the bilateral inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) for ambiguous-related compared to unambiguous-related stimulus pairs, demonstrating that prefrontal areas are activated even in an implicit task where participants are not required to explicitly analyze the semantic content of the stimuli and to make an overt selection of a particular meaning based on this analysis. Additionally, increased activation was found in the left IFG and the left cingulate gyrus for subordinate meaning compared to dominant meaning conditions, suggesting that additional resources are recruited in order to resolve increased competition demands in accessing the subordinate meaning of an ambiguous word.

scholarly journals Pupil dilation is sensitive to semantic ambiguity and acoustic degradation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mason Kadem ◽  
Björn Herrmann ◽  
Jennifer M. Rodd ◽  
Ingrid S. Johnsrude
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Relatedness ◽  
Pupil Dilation ◽  
Speech Comprehension ◽  
Semantic Ambiguity ◽  
Complex Syntax ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Noise Masker ◽  
Sentence Level ◽  
Linguistic Challenges ◽  
The Brain

AbstractSpeech comprehension is often challenged by background noise or other acoustic interference. It can also be challenged by linguistic factors, such as complex syntax, or the presence of words with more than one meaning. Pupillometry is increasingly recognized as a technique that provides a window onto acoustic challenges, but this work has not been well integrated with an older literature linking pupil dilation to “mental effort”, which would include linguistic challenges. Here, we measured pupil dilation while listeners heard spoken sentences with clear sentence-level meaning that contained words with more than one meaning (“The shell was fired towards the tank”) or matched sentences without ambiguous words (“Her secrets were written in her diary”). This semantic-ambiguity manipulation was crossed with an acoustic manipulation: two levels of a 30-talker babble masker in Experiment 1; and presence or absence of a pink noise masker in Experiment 2. Speech comprehension, indexed by a semantic relatedness task, was high (above 82% correct) in all conditions. Pupils dilated when sentences included semantically ambiguous words compared to matched sentences and when maskers were present compared to absent (Experiment 2) or were more compared to less intense (Experiment 1). The current results reinforce the idea that many different challenges to speech comprehension, that afford different cognitive processes and are met by the brain in different ways, manifest as an increase in pupil dilation.

Accessing Ambiguous Words during Sentence Comprehension

1979 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 569-589 ◽  
Author(s):  
V. M. Holmes
Keyword(s):  
Visual Processing ◽  
Relative Frequency ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Frequency Effect ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Ambiguity Detection ◽  
Previous Sentence ◽  
Word Senses

In five experiments visual processing of sentences containing either a more frequent or a less frequent usage of an ambiguous word was examined. When prior or subsequent context was pragmatically related to the relevant sense of the ambiguous word, sentences intending the more frequent sense produced longer ambiguity detection times and shorter immediate comprehension times than sentences intending the less frequent sense. This relative frequency effect was not obtained in comprehension of corresponding unambiguous sentences containing relatively high or low frequency unambiguous synonyms of the senses. These results suggest that access of ambiguous word-senses tends to occur in order of relative frequency, and that multiple access of senses tends only to occur for low frequency usages. When the preceding verb imposed selection constraints on which sense could follow, the frequency effect did not occur consistently; and it was virtually eliminated when biasing context took the form of a previous sentence containing an unambiguous synonym of the relevant sense. Implications for models of access of unambiguous words in sentences, as well as for models of processing ambiguous sentences, are considered.

scholarly journals Listeners and Readers Generalise Their Experience With Word Meanings Across Modalities

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Anne Gilbert ◽  
Matthew H. Davis ◽  
M. Gareth Gaskell ◽  
Jennifer M Rodd
Keyword(s):  
Priming Effect ◽  
Word Association ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Semantic Relatedness ◽  
Recent Experience ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Subordinate Meaning ◽  
Target Words

Research has shown that adults’ lexical-semantic representations are surprisingly malleable. For instance, the interpretation of ambiguous words (e.g. bark) is influenced by experience such that recently encountered meanings become more readily available (Rodd et al., 2016, 2013). However the mechanism underlying this word-meaning priming effect remains unclear, and competing accounts make different predictions about the extent to which information about word meanings that is gained within one modality (e.g. speech) is transferred to the other modality (e.g. reading) to aid comprehension. In two web-based experiments, ambiguous target words were primed with either written or spoken sentences that biased their interpretation toward a subordinate meaning, or were unprimed. About 20 minutes after the prime exposure, interpretation of these target words was tested by presenting them in either written or spoken form, using word association (Experiment 1, N=78) and speeded semantic relatedness decisions (Experiment 2, N=181). Both experiments replicated the auditory unimodal priming effect shown previously (Rodd et al., 2016, 2013) and revealed significant cross-modal priming: primed meanings were retrieved more frequently and swiftly across all primed conditions compared to the unprimed baseline. Furthermore, there were no reliable differences in priming levels between unimodal and cross-modal prime-test conditions. These results indicate that recent experience with ambiguous word meanings can bias the reader’s or listener’s later interpretation of these words in a modality-general way. We identify possible loci of this effect within the context of models of long-term priming and ambiguity resolution.

scholarly journals Contribution to Semantic Analysis of Arabic Language

2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anis Zouaghi ◽  
Mounir Zrigui ◽  
Georges Antoniadis ◽  
Laroussi Merhbene
Keyword(s):  
Information Retrieval ◽  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
String Matching ◽  
Ambiguous Word ◽  
Arabic Language ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Matching Algorithm ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Lesk Algorithm ◽  
Context Of Use

We propose a new approach for determining the adequate sense of Arabic words. For that, we propose an algorithm based on information retrieval measures to identify the context of use that is the closest to the sentence containing the word to be disambiguated. The contexts of use represent a set of sentences that indicates a particular sense of the ambiguous word. These contexts are generated using the words that define the senses of the ambiguous words, the exact string-matching algorithm, and the corpus. We use the measures employed in the domain of information retrieval, Harman, Croft, and Okapi combined to the Lesk algorithm, to assign the correct sense of those proposed.

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