Jove
Visualize
Contact Us
JoVE
x logofacebook logolinkedin logoyoutube logo
ABOUT JoVE
OverviewLeadershipBlogJoVE Help Center
AUTHORS
Publishing ProcessEditorial BoardScope & PoliciesPeer ReviewFAQSubmit
LIBRARIANS
TestimonialsSubscriptionsAccessResourcesLibrary Advisory BoardFAQ
RESEARCH
JoVE JournalMethods CollectionsJoVE Encyclopedia of ExperimentsArchive
EDUCATION
JoVE CoreJoVE BusinessJoVE Science EducationJoVE Lab ManualFaculty Resource CenterFaculty Site
Terms & Conditions of Use
Privacy Policy
Policies

Related Concept Videos

Feedback Inhibition00:46

Feedback Inhibition

56.9K
Biochemical reactions are occurring constantly in cells, converting starting substances to different products, usually with the help of enzymes that speed the reactions. Without enzymes, it would take far too long for most reactions to occur to be useful to the cell!
56.9K
Self-Awareness and Its Effects01:21

Self-Awareness and Its Effects

288
Self-awareness is a psychological state in which the individual becomes the focal point of their attention. This inward focus transforms the self into an object of contemplation and assessment, influencing how individuals perceive their actions and their alignment with personal and societal standards.Triggers and Contexts for Self-AwarenessSelf-awareness can be activated by external stimuli that make individuals visually or audibly aware of themselves, such as mirrors, cameras, or recordings.
288
Altered States of Awareness01:06

Altered States of Awareness

1.0K
Altered states of consciousness represent significant deviations from one's normal mental state. These deviations can range from subtle changes in awareness to profound transformations in perception, thought processes, and sensory experiences. Altered states of consciousness can be triggered by various factors, including drug use, meditation, hypnosis, illness, or even intense fatigue.
The ingestion of substances like stimulants or hallucinogens leads to chemical alterations in the brain...
1.0K
Subconsciousness and No Awareness01:15

Subconsciousness and No Awareness

669
The concept of subconscious awareness refers to the processing of information below the level of conscious thought, which significantly influences both behaviors and decisions. It is also known as waking subconscious awareness. This complex level of cognition operates without the direct awareness of the individual, facilitating rapid and simultaneous handling of multiple information streams.
An illustrative example of subconscious processing is its role in problem-solving. Often, individuals...
669
Language01:16

Language

892
Language is a unique communication system that uses words and systematic rules to organize and transmit information. Unlike other forms of communication, which may involve postures, movements, odors, or vocalizations, language relies on symbols and grammar. This makes human communication distinct from that of other species, who also communicate but do not use language in the same way humans do.
Corballis and Suddendorf (2007) and Tomasello and Rakoczy (2003) highlight the role of language in...
892
High-Level and Low-Level Awareness01:19

High-Level and Low-Level Awareness

631
Controlled processes in human consciousness represent high-alert mental states where individuals deliberately focus their attention on achieving specific goals. Controlled processes can be seen in situations like mastering new technology, where a person might become so absorbed that they ignore surrounding distractions. Such processes involve selective attention, requiring one to concentrate on particular elements of experience while disregarding others. These are governed by executive...
631

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by
Same author

Individual differences in speech monitoring: Functional and structural correlates of delayed auditory feedback.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·2026
Same author

To what extent do pragmatic cues from disfluencies inform our predictions of spoken language during naturalistic language processing?

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior·2026
Same author

The act of detecting a stimulus contaminates measures of conscious experience with decision biases.

Nature communications·2026
Same author

Gesture-Speech Interaction Beyond Planning: Evidence from Perturbations During Iconic Gesture and Speech Execution.

Quarterly journal of experimental psychology (2006)·2026
Same author

Altered Theory of Mind Engagement and Neural Alignment in Social Anxiety During Movie Viewing.

Biological psychiatry global open science·2026
Same author

Disfluencies reduce the effect of uh … word surprisal during narrative comprehension.

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior·2026

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jan 21, 2026

An Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effects of Ageing on Sentence Processing
04:30

An Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effects of Ageing on Sentence Processing

Published on: October 25, 2019

6.0K

No language unification without neural feedback: How awareness affects sentence processing.

Valeria Mongelli1, Erik L Meijs2, Simon van Gaal3

  • 1Neurobiology of Language Department, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Wundtlaan 1, 6525 XD, Nijmegen, the Netherlands; Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Nieuwe Achtergracht 129-B, 1018 WT, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Amsterdam Brain and Cognition (ABC), University of Amsterdam, Nieuwe Achtergracht 129-B, 1018 WT, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Neuroimage
|August 4, 2019
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

The human brain needs long-range feedback for sentence processing, but not for single words. This study used masking to show feedback is crucial for combining words into meaningful sentences.

Keywords:
FeedbackN400Sentence processingSingle word processingVisual masking

More Related Videos

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language
09:27

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language

Published on: October 13, 2018

10.7K
Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism
06:15

Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism

Published on: October 3, 2018

8.1K

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Jan 21, 2026

An Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effects of Ageing on Sentence Processing
04:30

An Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effects of Ageing on Sentence Processing

Published on: October 25, 2019

6.0K
Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language
09:27

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language

Published on: October 13, 2018

10.7K
Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism
06:15

Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism

Published on: October 3, 2018

8.1K

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Cognitive Science
  • Psycholinguistics

Background:

  • The human brain generates infinite sentences from finite words.
  • The Memory, Unification and Control (MUC) model posits feedback from the left inferior frontal cortex (LIFC) to left posterior temporal cortex (LPTC) for sentence processing.
  • Single word processing may rely on feedforward semantic information flow.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To test if long-range feedback is essential for sentence processing.
  • To investigate sentence comprehension under reduced visual awareness using masking.
  • To determine if word combination into sentences occurs without awareness.

Main Methods:

  • Electroencephalography (EEG) was used to measure brain activity in 40 subjects.
  • A masked priming task involved presenting words successively or simultaneously to form sentences.
  • Stimuli were either masked (reduced awareness) or unmasked, compared against single word conditions.
  • The N400 event-related potential (ERP) effect was analyzed as a neural signature of semantic incongruity.

Main Results:

  • Masked single words elicited an N400 effect.
  • Masked sentences did not elicit an N400 effect, indicating impaired processing.
  • Unmasked sentences and single words both elicited N400 effects.
  • Feedforward processing of single words is sufficient, but sentence-level integration requires feedback.

Conclusions:

  • Long-range feedback processing is necessary for combining words into sentences.
  • Sentence processing under reduced awareness is impaired, unlike single word processing.
  • These findings support the MUC model's emphasis on feedback for complex linguistic integration.