PROCESSING RELATIVE CLAUSES VARYING ON SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC DIMENSIONS :AN ANALYSIS WITH EVENT-RELATED POTENTIALS

摘要: Event-related potentials were used to study how parsing of German relative clauses is influenced by semantic information. Subjects read well-formed sentences containing either a subject or an object clause and answered questions concerning the thematic roles expressed in those sentences. Half contained past participles that on grounds plausibility biased reading; other half provided no information favoring reading. The participle elicited N400 component, larger amplitude for neutral than semantically verbs, but this occurred only case clauses. More specific effects obtained subgroup subjects, when these grouped into fast slow comprehenders basis their questionanswering reaction times. Fast showed amplitudes general N400s latter there was bias reading as opposed Syntactic ambiguity resolution, indicated auxiliary sentence final position, associated with positive component (P345), auxiliaries indicating independent biasing given preceding participle. Implications findings models language comprehension are considered.