Schumacher Petra B, Baumann Stefan
Independent Emmy Noether Research Group, Department of English and Linguistics, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, 55099 Mainz, Germany.
Neuroreport. 2010 Jun 23;21(9):618-22. doi: 10.1097/WNR.0b013e328339874a.
Discourse processing depends on semantic memory as well as maintaining and updating of a mental model. Using event-related potentials, we investigated how a referent's information status (new, accessible, given) is processed in combination with three different prosodic realizations (an appropriate accent and two inappropriate accents). The data reveal a biphasic N400-late positivity pattern, indicating that prosodic information affects an early discourse linking stage, during which prominence information reflecting a referent's accessibility is computed (N400), and a later discourse updating stage, during which conflicts between prosodic information and a referent's actual information status are detected (late positivity). Crucially, the data show that the N400 is not only sensitive to lexico-semantic relations but also to discourse accessibility induced by prosodic cues.
语篇处理依赖于语义记忆以及心理模型的维持和更新。我们利用事件相关电位，研究了指称对象的信息状态（新信息、可及信息、已知信息）如何与三种不同的韵律实现方式（一种合适的重音和两种不合适的重音）相结合进行处理。数据揭示了一种双相的N400-晚期正波模式，表明韵律信息影响早期的语篇衔接阶段，在此阶段计算反映指称对象可及性的突显信息（N400），以及后期的语篇更新阶段，在此阶段检测韵律信息与指称对象实际信息状态之间的冲突（晚期正波）。至关重要的是，数据表明N400不仅对词汇语义关系敏感，而且对韵律线索引发的语篇可及性敏感。
