How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study

Prediction is often assumed to play a crucial role during language comprehension. While some theories propose that prediction robustly affects at all levels of linguistic representation, empirical evidence suggests that the circumstances under which linguistic predictions occur appear to be limited,...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ito, A, Husband, E
Format: Conference item
Published: IEICE 2017
_version_ 1797069992179531776
author Ito, A
Husband, E
author_facet Ito, A
Husband, E
author_sort Ito, A
collection OXFORD
description Prediction is often assumed to play a crucial role during language comprehension. While some theories propose that prediction robustly affects at all levels of linguistic representation, empirical evidence suggests that the circumstances under which linguistic predictions occur appear to be limited, particularly when comparing prediction of phonological information to semantic information. To more directly explore these limits, we compared effects of semantic and phonological prediction in a visual world eye-tracking study. Participants heard sentences where the target word was either predictable (e.g., ?That dog looks so happy, wagging its tail ??) or unpredictable (?If there is one, click on the picture of the tail.?), while viewing objects that corresponded to either the target word (tail), a semantic competitor word (paw), a phonological competitor word (table), or an unrelated word (daisy). Target and semantic competitor objects attracted more fixations than unrelated objects well before the target word onset in predictable sentences and not in unpredictable sentences, suggesting that participants predicted semantic information. However, there were no predictive eye movements for phonological competitor objects. The results suggest that phonological prediction is not as robust as semantic prediction.
first_indexed 2024-03-06T22:32:36Z
format Conference item
id oxford-uuid:58c466bc-370d-4b43-a5c6-4411401532e3
institution University of Oxford
last_indexed 2024-03-06T22:32:36Z
publishDate 2017
publisher IEICE
record_format dspace
spelling oxford-uuid:58c466bc-370d-4b43-a5c6-4411401532e32022-03-26T17:05:40ZHow robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking studyConference itemhttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_5794uuid:58c466bc-370d-4b43-a5c6-4411401532e3Symplectic Elements at OxfordIEICE2017Ito, AHusband, EPrediction is often assumed to play a crucial role during language comprehension. While some theories propose that prediction robustly affects at all levels of linguistic representation, empirical evidence suggests that the circumstances under which linguistic predictions occur appear to be limited, particularly when comparing prediction of phonological information to semantic information. To more directly explore these limits, we compared effects of semantic and phonological prediction in a visual world eye-tracking study. Participants heard sentences where the target word was either predictable (e.g., ?That dog looks so happy, wagging its tail ??) or unpredictable (?If there is one, click on the picture of the tail.?), while viewing objects that corresponded to either the target word (tail), a semantic competitor word (paw), a phonological competitor word (table), or an unrelated word (daisy). Target and semantic competitor objects attracted more fixations than unrelated objects well before the target word onset in predictable sentences and not in unpredictable sentences, suggesting that participants predicted semantic information. However, there were no predictive eye movements for phonological competitor objects. The results suggest that phonological prediction is not as robust as semantic prediction.
spellingShingle Ito, A
Husband, E
How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study
title How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study
title_full How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study
title_fullStr How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study
title_full_unstemmed How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study
title_short How robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension? A visual world eye-tracking study
title_sort how robust are effects of semantic and phonological prediction during language comprehension a visual world eye tracking study
work_keys_str_mv AT itoa howrobustareeffectsofsemanticandphonologicalpredictionduringlanguagecomprehensionavisualworldeyetrackingstudy
AT husbande howrobustareeffectsofsemanticandphonologicalpredictionduringlanguagecomprehensionavisualworldeyetrackingstudy