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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 2, 2026

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential ERP Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

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Unlocking Second Language Novel Metaphor Processing: Behavioral and ERP Insights From First and Second-Language

Adriana R Miller^1,2, Rafał Jończyk^3,4, Holly A Zaharchuk^1,2

¹Department of Psychology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA.

Psychophysiology

|May 9, 2025

Summary

Processing novel metaphors in a second language (L2) is more effortful for bilinguals than monolinguals. L2 users made more errors and showed different brain responses (event-related potentials) when understanding new metaphors.

Keywords:

ERPs N400 creativity metaphor second language

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Area of Science:

Cognitive Neuroscience
Psycholinguistics
Second Language Acquisition

Background:

Novel metaphor processing offers insights into creative conceptual expansion.
Event-related potentials (ERPs), specifically the N400 component, track semantic anomaly detection and integration.
Previous research on novel metaphor processing primarily involved monolinguals, leaving bilinguals' second language (L2) processing understudied.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate how L2 English speakers process full-sentence novel metaphors.
To compare L2 metaphor processing with that of English monolinguals.
To test hypotheses regarding whether L2 conceptual expansion is more effortful, efficient, or similar to L1 processing.

Main Methods:

Employed single-trial event-related potentials (ERPs) and behavioral measures.
Assessed L2 English users' processing of novel metaphors within naturalistic full sentences.
Compared L2 results to a prior study on monolingual English speakers using identical experimental paradigms.

Main Results:

L2 English users exhibited more effortful processing compared to monolinguals.
L2 users demonstrated higher rates of sentence evaluation errors, particularly for anomalous sentences.
ERP data revealed an N400 semantic anomaly effect in L2 users, but without significant differentiation between metaphorical, literal, or anomalous sentences, unlike the graded effect observed in monolinguals.

Conclusions:

Novel metaphor processing in L2 is more cognitively demanding than in L1.
Bilinguals face unique challenges in incremental processing and integration of L2 metaphorical sentences.
Findings contribute to understanding L2 conceptual expansion and the cognitive load of processing figurative language in a non-native language.