1Department of Psychology, University of Arizona.
Psychol Sci. 2014 Jan;25(1):256-64. doi: 10.1177/0956797613502814. Epub 2013 Nov 12.
Traditional theories of perception posit that only objects access semantics; abutting, patently shapeless grounds do not. Surprisingly, this assumption has been untested until now. In two experiments, participants classified silhouettes as depicting meaningful real-world or meaningless novel objects while event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded. The borders of half of the novel objects suggested portions of meaningful objects on the ground side. Participants were unaware of these meaningful objects because grounds are perceived as shapeless. In Experiment 1, in which silhouettes were presented twice, N400 ERP repetition effects indicated that semantics were accessed for novel silhouettes that suggested meaningful objects in the ground and for silhouettes that depicted real-world objects, but not for novel silhouettes that did not suggest meaningful objects in the ground. In Experiment 2, repetition was manipulated via matching prime words. This experiment replicated the effect observed in Experiment 1. These experiments provide the first neurophysiological evidence that semantic access can occur for the apparently shapeless ground side of a border.
传统的感知理论假设只有物体才能获得语义；而相邻的、明显无形状的背景则不能。令人惊讶的是，直到现在这个假设才得到验证。在两项实验中，参与者在记录事件相关电位（ERP）的同时，将剪影分类为描绘有意义的现实世界物体或无意义的新颖物体。一半的新物体的边界暗示了地面上有意义物体的部分。参与者没有意识到这些有意义的物体，因为地面被认为是没有形状的。在实验 1 中，剪影被呈现了两次，N400 ERP 重复效应表明，对于暗示地面上有意义物体的新剪影和描绘现实世界物体的剪影，可以获得语义，但对于没有暗示地面上有意义物体的新剪影则不能。在实验 2 中，通过匹配的启动词来操纵重复。这个实验复制了实验 1 中观察到的效果。这些实验首次提供了神经生理学证据，表明语义可以在边界的明显无形状的背景侧发生。
