syntax 8 on-line processing day 37 – nov 22, 2013 brain & language ling 4110-4890-5110-7960...

SYNTAX 8ON-LINE PROCESSINGDAY 37 – NOV 22, 2013

Brain & Language

LING 4110-4890-5110-7960

NSCI 4110-4891-6110

Harry Howard

Tulane University

2

Course organization• The syllabus, these slides and my recordings are

available at http://www.tulane.edu/~howard/LING4110/.• If you want to learn more about EEG and neurolinguistics,

you are welcome to participate in my lab. This is also a good way to get started on an honor's thesis.

• The grades are posted to Blackboard.

11/22/13 Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University

http://www.tulane.edu/~howard/LING4110/

REVIEW

11/22/13 Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University 3

4

Cross-modal priming & trace reactivationsentence presented auditorily; prime & probe visually


16) Which booki did the harassed parent almost purchase ti for her child?

prime

probe:library/vehicle

faster for related same for both faster for related

5

Self-paced reading & subject-object• The data: reading time for us20a) My brother wanted to know if Ruth will bring us home to Mom at Xmas.

20b) My brother wanted to know who will bring us home to Mom at Xmas.

20b) My brother wanted to know whoi ti will bring us home to Mom at Xmas.

20c) My brother wanted to know who Ruth will bring us home to at Xmas.

20c) My brother wanted to know whoi Ruth will bring us home to ti at Xmas.

• Which one should be slowest?• (20c) because us is a possible site for the gap/trace of who.


6

NEURAL IMAGING & ON-LINE SENTENCE PROCESSING


7

Dipoles, 3


Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University 8

Result of electrical currents: EEG

11/22/13

Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University 9

Scalp EEG

• Scalp EEG is collected from tens to hundreds of electrodes positioned on different locations at the surface of the head.

• EEG signals (in the range of millivolts) are amplified and digitalized for later processing.

11/22/13

The 10-20 system• The "10" and "20" refer to the fact that the

actual distances between adjacent electrodes are either 10% or 20% of the total front-back or right-left distance of the skull.

• Each site has a letter to identify the lobe and a number to identify the hemisphere location. The letters F, T, C, P and O stand for Frontal, Temporal, Central, Parietal, and Occipital, respectively.

• Note that there exists no central lobe, the "C" letter is only used for identification purposes only.

• A "z" (zero) refers to an electrode placed on the midline.

• Even numbers (2,4,6,8) refer to electrode positions on the right hemisphere, whereas odd numbers (1,3,5,7) refer to those on the left hemisphere.

• Two anatomical landmarks are used for the essential positioning of the EEG electrodes: first, the nasion which is the point between the forehead and the nose; second, the inion which is the lowest point of the skull from the back of the head and is normally indicated by a prominent bump.


11

Semantic vs. syntactic ERPs• The data

a. The boat sailed down the river and sank.

b. The boat sailed down the river and ate.

c. The boat sailed down the river sank.

• How would you characterize these sentences?a. well-formed

b. semantically anomalous

c. syntactically anomalous


12

ERPs to last verb in sentenceFig. 13.4 – Ingram doesn’t reveal source


What does the scale mean?

Where does the dashed line diverge most from the solid line?

Where does the dotted line diverge most from the solid line?

13

What do they do?• N400

• A temporarily localized increase in processing load caused by a discrepancy in between the meaning of a word and its sentential context.

• P600• A sustained effort to reinterpret or re-parse a garden path

sentence.

• However, these two may be too slow to reflect modular lexical or syntactic processing.• So lets look at a faster ERP.


14

The early left anterior negativityN150 or ELAN


Basic flaws in phrase structure:The shirt was on the hanger.The shirt was ironed.*The shirt was on ironed.

15

Modular vs. interactive processingTable 13.1. adapted from Frisch et al. (2004)

English example(orig. German)

Phrase structure obeyed

Argument structure obeyed

N150 N400 P600

The old cat slept in the garden and …

✔ ✔ -- -- --

The cat old slept in the garden and …

✖ ✔ ✔ ✖ ✔

The old cat slept the garden and …

✔ ✖ ✖ ✔ ✔

The cat old slept the garden and …

✖ ✖ ✔ ✖ ✔


Modular: an error found early could turn off additional processing. Interactive: errors should add up.

NEXT TIMEThere is no quiz.

Ingram §14, Agrammatism revisited


syntax 8 on-line processing day 37 – nov 22, 2013 brain & language ling 4110-4890-5110-7960...

Documents