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Peter Hagoort - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.

  • pitch accent and Lexical tone processing in chinese discourse comprehension an erp study
    Brain Research, 2008
    Co-Authors: Xiao Qing Li, Yufang Yang, Peter Hagoort
    Abstract:

    Abstract In the present study, event-related brain potentials (ERP) were recorded to investigate the role of pitch accent and Lexical tone in spoken discourse comprehension. Chinese was used as material to explore the potential difference in the nature and time course of brain responses to sentence Meaning as indicated by pitch accent and to Lexical Meaning as indicated by tone. In both cases, the pitch contour of critical words was varied. The results showed that both inconsistent pitch accent and inconsistent Lexical tone yielded N400 effects, and there was no interaction between them. The negativity evoked by inconsistent pitch accent had the some topography as that evoked by inconsistent Lexical tone violation, with a maximum over central–parietal electrodes. Furthermore, the effect for the combined violations was the sum of effects for pure pitch accent and pure Lexical tone violation. However, the effect for the Lexical tone violation appeared approximately 90 ms earlier than the effect of the pitch accent violation. It is suggested that there might be a correspondence between the neural mechanism underlying pitch accent and Lexical Meaning processing in context. They both reflect the integration of the current information into a discourse context, independent of whether the current information was sentence Meaning indicated by accentuation, or Lexical Meaning indicated by tone. In addition, Lexical Meaning was processed earlier than sentence Meaning conveyed by pitch accent during spoken language processing.

  • on line integration of semantic information from speech and gesture insights from event related brain potentials
    Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 2007
    Co-Authors: Asli Ozyurek, Roel M Willems, Sotaro Kita, Peter Hagoort
    Abstract:

    During language comprehension, listeners use the global semantic representation from previous sentence or discourse context to immediately integrate the Meaning of each upcoming word into the unfolding message-level representation. Here we investigate whether communicative gestures that often spontaneously co-occur with speech are processed in a similar fashion and integrated to previous sentence context in the same way as Lexical Meaning. Event-related potentials were measured while subjects listened to spoken sentences with a critical verb (e.g., knock), which was accompanied by an iconic co-speech gesture (i.e., KNOCK). Verbal and/or gestural semantic content matched or mismatched the content of the preceding part of the sentence. Despite the difference in the modality and in the specificity of Meaning conveyed by spoken words and gestures, the latency, amplitude, and topographical distribution of both word and gesture mismatches are found to be similar, indicating that the brain integrates both types of information simultaneously. This provides evidence for the claim that neural processing in language comprehension involves the simultaneous incorporation of information coming from a broader domain of cognition than only verbal semantics. The neural evidence for similar integration of information from speech and gesture emphasizes the tight interconnection between speech and co-speech gestures.

  • syntactic processing in left prefrontal cortex is independent of Lexical Meaning
    NeuroImage, 2001
    Co-Authors: Peter Indefrey, Peter Hagoort, Hans Herzog, Rudiger J Seitz, Colin M Brown
    Abstract:

    In language comprehension a syntactic representation is built up even when the input is semantically uninterpretable. We report data on brain activation during syntactic processing, from an experiment on the detection of grammatical errors in Meaningless sentences. The experimental paradigm was such that the syntactic processing was distinguished from other cognitive and linguistic functions. The data reveal that in syntactic error detection an area of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, adjacent to Broca's area, is specifically involved in the syntactic processing aspects, whereas other prefrontal areas subserve general error detection processes.

  • the shadows of Lexical Meaning in patients with semantic impairments
    Handbook of Neurolinguistics, 1998
    Co-Authors: Peter Hagoort
    Abstract:

    Central in the processing of words is the retrieval of their Meaning. Neurological diseases can affect the processing of Lexical Meaning in a number of ways. First, various examples of semantic impairments are discussed, including semantic paraphasias, deep dyslexic reading errors, and category-general and category-specific impairments in the semantics of concrete nouns. Next a number of theoretically relevant issues in studies on semantic impairments are discussed: (a) the concreteness effect, (b) impairments of perceptual versus functional information, (c) amodal versus multiple semantic systems, and (d) access impairments versus storage deficits. On the basis of a review of the neuropsychological evidence, it is proposed that the representation of Lexical Meaning consists of conceptual structures tied to models that are tailored to the requirements of the different sensory systems and the motor system.

Christian Retoré - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.

  • Natural Language Semantics and Computability
    Journal of Logic Language and Information, 2019
    Co-Authors: Richard Moot, Christian Retoré
    Abstract:

    This paper is a reflexion on the computability of natural language semantics. It does not contain a new model or new results in the formal semantics of natural language: it is rather a computational analysis, in the context for type-logical grammars, of the logical models and algorithms currently used in natural language semantics, defined as a function from a grammatical sentence to a (non-empty) set of logical formulas—because a statement can be ambiguous, it can correspond to multiple formulas, one for each reading. We argue that as long as we do not explicitly compute the interpretation in terms of possible world models, one can compute the semantic representation(s) of a given statement, including aspects of Lexical Meaning. This is a very generic process, so the results are, at least in principle, widely applicable. We also discuss the algorithmic complexity of this process.

  • Natural Language Semantics and Computability
    arXiv: Computation and Language, 2016
    Co-Authors: Richard Moot, Christian Retoré
    Abstract:

    This paper is a reflexion on the computability of natural language semantics. It does not contain a new model or new results in the formal semantics of natural language: it is rather a computational analysis of the logical models and algorithms currently used in natural language semantics, defined as the mapping of a statement to logical formulas - formulas, because a statement can be ambiguous. We argue that as long as possible world semantics is left out, one can compute the semantic representation(s) of a given statement, including aspects of Lexical Meaning. We also discuss the algorithmic complexity of this process.

  • Are Books Events? Ontological Inclusions as Coercive Sub-Typing, Lexical Transfers as Entailment
    2015
    Co-Authors: Bruno Mery, Christian Retoré
    Abstract:

    We present a way to combine coercive sub-typing relations, used to model ontological inclusions, and entailment using polymorphic terms provided by the lexicon in order to provide a coherent calculus integrated in L TY n. The resulting system is able to parse different types of Lexical phenomena. We also illustrate differences of assumptions between related theories of Lexical Meaning , using the different ways to define coercive sub-typing and type systems as examples.

Ruth Herbert - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.

  • morpho syntactic processing of arabic plurals after aphasia dissecting Lexical Meaning from morpho syntax within word boundaries
    Cognitive Neuropsychology, 2015
    Co-Authors: Tariq Khwaileh, Richard Body, Ruth Herbert
    Abstract:

    Within the domain of inflectional morpho-syntax, differential processing of regular and irregular forms has been found in healthy speakers and in aphasia. One view assumes that irregular forms are retrieved as full entities, while regular forms are compiled on-line. An alternative view holds that a single mechanism oversees regular and irregular forms. Arabic offers an opportunity to study this phenomenon, as Arabic nouns contain a consonantal root, delivering Lexical Meaning, and a vocalic pattern, delivering syntactic information, such as gender and number. The aim of this study is to investigate morpho-syntactic processing of regular (sound) and irregular (broken) Arabic plurals in patients with morpho-syntactic impairment. Three participants with acquired agrammatic aphasia produced plural forms in a picture-naming task. We measured overall response accuracy, then analysed Lexical errors and morpho-syntactic errors, separately. Error analysis revealed different patterns of morpho-syntactic errors depending on the type of pluralization (sound vs broken). Omissions formed the vast majority of errors in sound plurals, while substitution was the only error mechanism that occurred in broken plurals. The dissociation was statistically significant for retrieval of morpho-syntactic information (vocalic pattern) but not for Lexical Meaning (consonantal root), suggesting that the participants' selective impairment was an effect of the morpho-syntax of plurals. These results suggest that irregular plurals forms are stored, while regular forms are derived. The current findings support the findings from other languages and provide a new analysis technique for data from languages with non-concatenative morpho-syntax.

Mohammad Taher Pilehvar - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.

  • from word to sense embeddings a survey on vector representations of Meaning
    Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, 2018
    Co-Authors: Jose Camachocollados, Mohammad Taher Pilehvar
    Abstract:

    Over the past years, distributed semantic representations have proved to be effective and flexible keepers of prior knowledge to be integrated into downstream applications. This survey focuses on the representation of Meaning. We start from the theoretical background behind word vector space models and highlight one of their major limitations: the Meaning conflation deficiency, which arises from representing a word with all its possible Meanings as a single vector. Then, we explain how this deficiency can be addressed through a transition from the word level to the more fine-grained level of word senses (in its broader acceptation) as a method for modelling unambiguous Lexical Meaning. We present a comprehensive overview of the wide range of techniques in the two main branches of sense representation, i.e., unsupervised and knowledge-based. Finally, this survey covers the main evaluation procedures and applications for this type of representation, and provides an analysis of four of its important aspects: interpretability, sense granularity, adaptability to different domains and compositionality.

Kai Alter - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.

  • the sense of sounds brain responses to phonotactic frequency phonological grammar and Lexical Meaning
    Frontiers in Psychology, 2019
    Co-Authors: Susana Silva, Marina Vigario, Barbara Leone Fernandez, Rita Jeronimo, Kai Alter, Sonia Frota
    Abstract:

    Two outstanding questions in spoken-language comprehension concern (1) the interplay of phonological grammar (legal vs. illegal sound sequences), phonotactic frequency (high- vs. low-frequency sound sequences) and Lexicality (words vs. other sound sequences) in a Meaningful context, and (2) how the properties of phonological sequences determine their inclusion or exclusion from Lexical-semantic processing. In the present study, we used a picture-sound priming paradigm to examine the ERP responses of adult listeners to grammatically illegal sound sequences, to grammatically legal sound sequences (pseudowords) with low- vs. high-frequency, and to real words that were either congruent or incongruent to the picture context. Results showed less negative N1-P2 responses for illegal sequences and low-frequency pseudowords (with differences in topography), but not high-frequency ones. Low-frequency pseudowords also showed an increased P3 component. However, just like illegal sequences, neither low- nor high-frequency pseudowords differed from congruent words in the N400. Thus, phonotactic frequency had an impact before, but not during Lexical-semantic processing. Our results also suggest that phonological grammar, phonotactic frequency and Lexicality may follow each other in this order during word processing.

  • psychoacoustic studies on the processing of vocal interjections how to disentangle Lexical and prosodic information
    Progress in Brain Research, 2006
    Co-Authors: Susanne Dietrich, Hermann Ackermann, Diana P Szameitat, Kai Alter
    Abstract:

    Abstract Both intonation (affective prosody) and Lexical Meaning of verbal utterances participate in the vocal expression of a speaker's emotional state, an important aspect of human communication. However, it is still a matter of debate how the information of these two ‘channels’ is integrated during speech perception. In order to further analyze the impact of affective prosody on Lexical access, so-called interjections , i.e., short verbal emotional utterances, were investigated. The results of a series of psychoacoustic studies indicate the processing of emotional interjections to be mediated by a divided cognitive mechanism encompassing both Lexical access and the encoding of prosodic data. Emotional interjections could be separated into elements with high- or low-Lexical content. As concerns the former items, both prosodic and propositional cues have a significant influence upon recognition rates, whereas the processing of the low-Lexical cognates rather solely depends upon prosodic information. Incongruencies between Lexical and prosodic data structures compromise stimulus identification. Thus, the analysis of utterances characterized by a dissociation of the prosodic and Lexical dimension revealed prosody to exert a stronger impact upon listeners’ judgments than Lexicality. Taken together, these findings indicate that both propositional and prosodic speech components closely interact during speech perception.