Referential Chains Reveal Predictive Processes and Form-to-Function Mapping: An Electroencephalographic Study Using Naturalistic Story Stimuli

• Published in: Frontiers in psychology Vol. 12; p. 623648
• Main Authors: Brilmayer, Ingmar, Schumacher, Petra B.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Frontiers Media S.A 19.08.2021
• Subjects: form-to-function mapping; naturalistic stimuli; P300; prediction; prominence; Psychology
• ISSN: 1664-1078; 1664-1078
• DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.623648

In discourse pragmatics, different referential forms are claimed to be indicative of the cognitive status of a referent in the current discourse. Referential expressions thereby possess a double function: They point back to an (existing) referent (form-to-function mapping), and they are used to derive predictions about a referent’s subsequent recurrence in discourse. Existing event-related potential (ERP) research has mainly focused on the form-to-function mapping of referential expression. In the present ERP study, we explore the relationship of form-to-function mapping and prediction derived from the antecedent of referential expressions in naturalistic auditory language comprehension. Specifically, the study investigates the relationship between the form of a referential expression (pronoun vs. noun) and the form of its antecedent (pronoun vs. noun); i.e., it examines the influence of the interplay of predictions derived from an antecedent (forward-looking function) and the form-to-function mapping of an anaphor (backward-looking function) on the ERPs time-locked to anaphoric expressions. The results in the time range of the P300 and N400 allow for a dissociation of these two functions during online language comprehension.