Syntactically based sentence processing classes: evidence from event-related brain potentials

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psycholinguistics
• Cognitive Science

Background:

• Language comprehension is theorized to involve separate semantic and grammatical processing subsystems.
• Empirical data from various studies support this modular view of language faculty.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the neural correlates of semantic and grammatical processing using event-related potentials (ERPs).
• To differentiate brain activity patterns associated with semantic anomalies versus various types of syntactic violations.

Main Methods:

• Recorded ERPs from 40 participants reading sentences with semantic anomalies or syntactic violations (phrase structure, specificity, subjacency).
• Analyzed ERPs for distinct timing and scalp distribution patterns corresponding to different linguistic violations.

Main Results:

• Semantic anomalies elicited a bilateral N400 potential over posterior regions.
• Phrase structure violations affected early left anterior negativity (N125) and later left temporal-parietal negativity.
• Specificity violations resulted in a slow negative potential over anterior left hemisphere.
• Subjacency violations produced a widespread bilateral positivity.

Conclusions:

• Distinct ERP patterns for different linguistic violations provide biological evidence for separate semantic and grammatical processing systems.
• Findings support theories distinguishing grammatical rules and constraints, and the modularity of the language faculty.