scholarly journals Task-specific contribution of the right posterior cerebellum to language processing in healthy individuals

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fleur L. P. Bongaerts ◽  
Dennis J. L. G. Schutter ◽  
Jana Klaus
Keyword(s):  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Unrelated Control ◽  
Manual Responses ◽  
The Right

Clinical and neuroscientific studies in healthy volunteers have established that the cerebellum contributes to language comprehension and production. Yet most evidence is correlational and the exact role of the cerebellum remains unclear. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of the right cerebellum in unimpaired language comprehension and production using non-invasive brain stimulation. In this double-blind, sham-controlled experiment, thirty-six healthy participants received anodal or sham transcranial direct current (tDCS) stimulation to the right cerebellum while performing a lexical decision, sentence comprehension, verbal fluency and language-unrelated control task. Results showed that anodal relative to sham tDCS caused faster manual responses in the lexical decision task. Additional exploratory analyses suggest load-specific performance modulation in the sentence comprehension and lexical decision task, with tDCS improving performance in low-load trials of the sentence comprehension task and high-load trials in the lexical decision task. Overall, our findings provide evidence for the involvement of the right posterior cerebellum in comprehension-based language tasks requiring a manual response. Further research is needed to dissociate the influence of task difficulty and timing of the underlying cognitive processes.

scholarly journals The Role of Literal Features During Processing of Novel Verbal Metaphors

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Camilo R. Ronderos ◽  
Ernesto Guerra ◽  
Pia Knoeferle
Keyword(s):  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Metaphor Comprehension ◽  
Video Clips ◽  
The North ◽  
Slow Moving

When a word is used metaphorically (for example “walrus” in the sentence “The president is a walrus”), some features of that word's meaning (“very fat,” “slow-moving”) are carried across to the metaphoric interpretation while other features (“has large tusks,” “lives near the north pole”) are not. What happens to these features that relate only to the literal meaning during processing of novel metaphors? In four experiments, the present study examined the role of the feature of physical containment during processing of verbs of physical containment. That feature is used metaphorically to signify difficulty, such as “fenced in” in the sentence “the journalist's opinion was fenced in after the change in regime.” Results of a lexical decision task showed that video clips displaying a ball being trapped by a box facilitated comprehension of verbs of physical containment when the words were presented in isolation. However, when the verbs were embedded in sentences that rendered their interpretation metaphorical in a novel way, no such facilitation was found, as evidenced by two eye-tracking reading studies. We interpret this as suggesting that features that are critical for understanding the encoded meaning of verbs but are not part of the novel metaphoric interpretation are ignored during the construction of metaphorical meaning. Results and limitations of the paradigm are discussed in relation to previous findings in the literature both on metaphor comprehension and on the interaction between language comprehension and the visual world.

The Oxford Handbook of Psycholinguistics

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Language Production ◽  
Text Comprehension ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
First Language ◽  
Grammatical Encoding ◽  
Current State

This handbook reviews the current state of the art in the field of psycholinguistics. Part I deals with language comprehension at the sublexical, lexical, and sentence and discourse levels. It explores concepts of speech representation and the search for universal speech segmentation mechanisms against a background of linguistic diversity and compares first language with second language segmentation. It also discusses visual word recognition, lexico-semantics, the different forms of lexical ambiguity, sentence comprehension, text comprehension, and language in deaf populations. Part II focuses on language production, with chapters covering topics such as word production and related processes based on evidence from aphasia, the major debates surrounding grammatical encoding. Part III considers various aspects of interaction and communication, including the role of gesture in language processing, approaches to the study of perspective-taking, and the interrelationships between language comprehension, emotion, and sociality. Part IV is concerned with language development and evolution, focusing on topics ranging from the development of prosodic phonology, the neurobiology of artificial grammar learning, and developmental dyslexia. The book concludes with Part V, which looks at methodological advances in psycholinguistic research, such as the use of intracranial electrophysiology in the area of language processing.

Stress properties of Greek compounds: Psycholinguistic considerations

2015 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-50
Author(s):  
Athanasios Tsiamas ◽  
Gonia Jarema ◽  
Eva Kehayia ◽  
Gevorg Chilingaryan
Keyword(s):  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Statistical Significance ◽  
Close Relation ◽  
Cognitive Status ◽  
Complex Interaction ◽  
Underlying Structure ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Auditory Lexical Decision

AbstractTheoretical accounts of Greek compounds argue for a close relation between their stress properties and their underlying structure. Compounds that preserve and receive stress at the same position as their second constituent are analyzed as stem-word constructions, while those that receive antepenultimate stress are viewed as belonging to the stem-stem category. Using an auditory lexical decision task, we examine the effect of stress change on the processing of compounds in the light of existing theoretical linguistic accounts. Although our experimental results do not reach statistical significance, we believe that they are informative of the cognitive status and role of stress in compound processing. Finally, they relate to existing theories of compounding in Greek and reflect the complex interaction of the psycholinguistic effects of stress and the structural properties of these constructions.

scholarly journals If I Cry, Do You Care?

2013 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Lockwood ◽  
Abigail Millings ◽  
Erica Hepper ◽  
Angela C. Rowe
Keyword(s):  
Individual Differences ◽  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Reaction Times ◽  
Cognitive Empathy ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Semantic Activation ◽  
Emotional Empathy

Crying is a powerful solicitation of caregiving, yet little is known about the cognitive processes underpinning caring responses to crying others. This study examined (1) whether crying (compared to sad and happy) faces differentially elicited semantic activation of caregiving, and (2) whether individual differences in cognitive and emotional empathy moderated this activation. Ninety participants completed a lexical decision task in which caregiving, neutral, and nonwords were presented after subliminal exposure (24 ms) to crying, sad, and happy faces. Individuals low in cognitive empathy had slower reaction times to caregiving (vs. neutral) words after exposure to crying faces, but not after sad or happy faces. Results are discussed with respect to the role of empathy in response to crying others.

The Impact of Reader Skill on Phonological processing in visual Word Recognition

2003 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-81 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara J. Unsworth ◽  
Penny M. Pexman
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Phonological Processing ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Skilled Readers ◽  
Phonological Activation ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Do So

There has been much debate about the role of phonology in reading. This debate has been fuelled, in part, by mixed findings for phonological effects in lexical decision tasks. In the present research we investigated the impact of reader skill on three phonological effects (homophone, homograph, and regularity effects) in a lexical decision task and in a phonological lexical decision task. In both tasks, the more skilled readers showed different patterns of phonological effects from those of the less skilled readers; in particular, less skilled readers showed regularity effects in both tasks whereas more skilled readers did not. We concluded that more skilled readers activate phonology in these tasks but do so more efficiently, with less spurious phonological activation.

Does stress matter?

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Athanasios Tsiamas ◽  
Gonia Jarema ◽  
Eva Kehayia
Keyword(s):  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Naming Task ◽  
Stress Change ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
Modern Greek ◽  
Significant Difference

Abstract This study investigates the effect of stress change during compound processing in Modern Greek. Twenty-five native speakers were tested in a cross-modal lexical decision task and a naming task in order to test for performance differences across stress-change vs. non-stress-change compounds. No statistically significant difference was found for the lexical decision task. However, the naming task showed a significant effect of stress change in compound processing, with the production of non-stress-change compounds showing facilitation. These results indicate that stress change is reflected in compound processing in Greek and underscore the importance of considering the interplay between specific tasks and the computational role of linguistic features.

scholarly journals Phonologic Mediation is Fundamental to Reading: Evidence from Beginning Readers

1996 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 715-744 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna M. T. Bosman ◽  
Annette de Groot
Keyword(s):  
Word Recognition ◽  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Beginning Reading ◽  
Beginning Readers ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Semantic Categorization ◽  
Skilled Reading ◽  
Advanced Readers

Three tasks were employed to investigate the role of assembled phonology in beginning readers. In two proofreading tasks, children had more trouble finding pseudohomophone misspellings (stimuli with phonology identical to that of a word) than control misspellings (stimuli that do not share their phonology with a word). In a lexical-decision task, they had more trouble deciding that pseudohomophone misspellings were non-words than deciding that control misspellings were non-words. Finally, in a semantic-categorization task, children had more trouble rejecting pseudohomophone misspellings as a member of a designated category than rejecting control misspellings. Differences between more and less advanced readers occurred, but they need not be attributed to differential use of phonology in word recognition. Instead, they were explained in terms of a difference between reader groups in spelling-verification efficiency. The results of the present studies on beginning reading parallel studies on skilled reading by Van Orden et al. (1992). The main conclusion was that assembled phonology plays an important role in word recognition in beginning readers.

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