Ball Lewis V, Kimel Eva, Keller Vanessa G, Ward Eloise, Cairney Scott A, Mak Matthew H C, Li Lu, Rodd Jennifer M, Gaskell M Gareth
Department of Psychology, University of York, UK.
Department of Psychology, University of York, UK.
Neuropsychologia. 2025 Aug 28;219:109264. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2025.109264.
The subordinate meaning of a homonym becomes temporarily more accessible after it is encountered, an effect termed word-meaning priming. Over the longer-term, word-meaning priming is better maintained across periods of sleep compared with wakefulness. This has been explained as sleep actively consolidating episodic memories related to recent linguistic events (Gaskell et al., 2019). Here, we tested this hypothesis by investigating whether word-meaning priming can be boosted following sleep using targeted memory reactivation (TMR), a technique of biassing specific memories for sleep-based consolidation by presenting information-associated sensory cues during sleep. In an exposure phase, 40 (of 80) homonyms were primed toward their subordinate meaning via a sentence, which was also associated with an auditory cue (the homonym) for TMR. Participants then took a ∼2 h nap, where half of the cues from exposure (memory cues) were replayed with the aim of strengthening the subordinate sentence meaning, along with 20 cues that had not been encountered previously (control cues). After sleep, there was an overall word-meaning priming effect, however there was no additional benefit of TMR on priming, nor did TMR benefit the recall of contextual information. Interestingly, there was an increased sleep spindle/beta band power response to memory cues relative to control cues, indicating cue-evoked memory reprocessing during sleep. These findings are consistent with a bounded role of sleep in actively consolidating linguistic-related memories.
同音异义词的次要意义在被遇到后会暂时变得更容易被获取，这种效应被称为词义启动。从长期来看，与清醒状态相比，词义启动在睡眠期间能得到更好的维持。这被解释为睡眠积极巩固与近期语言事件相关的情景记忆（加斯克尔等人，2019年）。在此，我们通过研究使用定向记忆重激活（TMR）技术（一种通过在睡眠期间呈现与信息相关的感官线索来偏向特定记忆以进行基于睡眠的巩固的技术）在睡眠后是否能增强词义启动来检验这一假设。在暴露阶段，通过一个句子使80个同音异义词中的40个偏向其次要意义，该句子也与用于TMR的听觉线索（同音异义词）相关联。参与者随后进行了约2小时的小睡，在小睡期间，来自暴露阶段的一半线索（记忆线索）被重放，目的是强化次要句子意义，同时还重放了20个之前未遇到过的线索（对照线索）。睡眠后，总体上存在词义启动效应，然而TMR对启动没有额外的益处，TMR也没有对上下文信息的回忆产生益处。有趣的是，相对于对照线索，对记忆线索的睡眠纺锤波/β波段功率反应有所增加，表明睡眠期间线索诱发的记忆再加工。这些发现与睡眠在积极巩固语言相关记忆方面的有限作用是一致的。
