Language and Cognition Laboratory, School of Humanities and Arts, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, China.
Language and Cognition Laboratory, School of Humanities and Arts, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, China.
Brain Res. 2021 Aug 15;1765:147499. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2021.147499. Epub 2021 Apr 22.
This study explored the processing mechanism of scalar implicatures under different focus conditions by the picture-sentence verification paradigm. Through the guidance of different types of incorrect sentences, scalar terms were controlled to adjust whether they were at the focus position and divided the focused and non-focused conditions. The behavioural results showed that when the content of the picture was "all squares have…", more participants under the focused condition could judge that the underinformative sentence "some squares have…" was not appropriate. Moreover, according to whether participants could stably determine that the underinformative sentences were inappropriate, they were divided into pragmatic and semantic responders. The ERP results showed that pragmatic responders evoked a P200 effect, an N400 effect and a sustained negativity effect according to the scalar terms, and a P200 effect and a sustained positivity effect according to the sentence-final words. In contrast, semantic responders did not elicit any ERP effect. These results indicate that the generation of scalar implicatures is not completely determined by the scalar terms and that the focus factor plays an important role in the scalar implicatures inference.
本研究采用图片-句子验证范式，探讨了不同焦点条件下数量蕴含的加工机制。通过不同类型错误句子的引导，控制数量词处于焦点位置或非焦点位置，从而划分出焦点和非焦点条件。行为结果表明，当图片内容为“所有正方形都有……”时，更多处于焦点条件下的被试可以判断非充分信息句“有些正方形有……”不合适。此外，根据被试是否能够稳定地判断非充分信息句不合适，将被试分为语用和语义反应者。ERP 结果表明，语用反应者根据数量词诱发了 P200 效应、N400 效应和持续负向效应，根据句尾词诱发了 P200 效应和持续正向效应。相比之下，语义反应者没有诱发任何 ERP 效应。这些结果表明，数量蕴含的产生不完全由数量词决定，焦点因素在数量蕴含推理中起着重要作用。
