Automatic and attentional processing: an event-related brain potential analysis of semantic priming

Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) and behavioral measures (reaction time and percentage errors) were measured in a semantic priming lexical decision task. In one block of trials, instructions and the proportion of related word pairs were designed to influence subjects to process the first member of each pair (prime) automatically. In another block, subjects were induced to attend to the meaning of each prime. ERPs to the primes were more positive between 200 and 600 msec and more negative between 750 and 1150 msec when subjects attended to the primes as opposed to when only automatic processing was required. Target word ERP activity between 200 and 525 msec (N400) was more negative in the neutral than in the semantically related condition in both blocks of trials, but more so in the attentional block, while a late ERP positively between 525 and 1100 msec (Slow Wave) was more positive in the unrelated than the neutral condition, but only in the attentional block. The results are discussed in terms of the two-process model proposed by Posner and Snyder (1975a, 1975b).