Evidence for a New Conceptualization of Semantic Representation in the Left and Right Cerebral Hemispheres

Deacon, Diana; Grose-Fifer, Jillian; Yang, Chien‐Ming; Stanick, Virginia; Hewitt, Sean; Dynowska, Anna

doi:10.1016/s0010-9452(08)70140-0

Cited by 53 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…This pattern is opposite to that predicted by coarse coding (Beeman et al, 1994), which argues that the RH should show greater activation for distant semantic information. However, the pattern is consistent with prior ERP work that also found greater LH facilitation for lexically associated information (Bouaffre and Faita-Ainseba, 2007;Coulson et al, 2005;Deacon et al, 2004). A set of behavioral studies (Kandhadai and Federmeier, 2007) using materials similar to those used here (but in a different order, with the homonym or corresponding unambiguous word occurring as a lateralized target in the triplet) also failed to find evidence in support of coarse coding; this was true whether distance was defined in terms of association strength or meaning consistency, as we find in the present study as well.…”

supporting

confidence: 90%

The effects of context, meaning frequency, and associative strength on semantic selection: Distinct contributions from each cerebral hemisphere

Meyer

Federmeier

2007

Brain Research

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The visual half-field procedure was used to examine hemispheric asymmetries in meaning selection. Event-related potentials were recorded as participants decided if a lateralized ambiguous or unambiguous prime was related in meaning to a centrally-presented target. Prime-target pairs were preceded by a related or unrelated centrally-presented context word. To separate the effects of meaning frequency and associative strength, unambiguous words were paired with concordant weakly-related context words and strongly-related targets (e.g., taste-sweet-candy) that were similar in associative strength to discordant subordinate-related context words and dominant-related targets (e.g., river-bank-deposit) in the ambiguous condition. Context words and targets were reversed in a second experiment. In an unrelated (neutral) context, N400 responses were more positive than baseline (facilitated) in all ambiguous conditions except when subordinate targets were presented on left visual field-right hemisphere (LVF-RH) trials. Thus, in the absence of biasing context information, the hemispheres seem to be differentially affected by meaning frequency, with the left maintaining multiple meanings and the right selecting the dominant meaning. In the presence of discordant context information, N400 facilitation was absent in both visual fields, indicating that the contextually-consistent meaning of the ambiguous word had been selected. In contrast, N400 facilitation occurred in all of the unambiguous conditions; however, the left hemisphere (LH) showed less facilitation for the weakly-related target when a strongly-related context was presented. These findings indicate that both hemispheres use context to guide meaning selection, but that the LH is more likely to focus activation on a single, contextually-relevant sense. KeywordsLexical Ambiguity; Cerebral Hemispheres; Context Effects; ERP; N400; LPC Based on evidence from studies using the visual half-field (VF) procedure with neurologicallyintact individuals (e.g., Burgess and Simpson, 1988), as well as studies involving participants with unilateral brain damage (e.g., Tompkins, Baumgartner, Lehman, and Fassbinder, 2000), it has been argued that the cerebral hemispheres differ in their processing of lexical semantics.Corresponding Author: Aaron M. Meyer, Beckman Institute, University of Illinois, 405 N. Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801, meyeram@uiuc.edu, (217) 244-9638. Publisher's Disclaimer: This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final citable form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain. NIH Public Access NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author ManuscriptMore specifically, it has been...

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supporting

confidence: 90%

The effects of context, meaning frequency, and associative strength on semantic selection: Distinct contributions from each cerebral hemisphere

Meyer

Federmeier

2007

Brain Research

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“…The current results also shed light on a model of lateralization which draws a distinction between categorical and associative semantic relationships [8, 13]. This model proposes that categories emerge from clusters of shared features, while associative relationships (e.g., dog-leash, which do not necessarily share semantic features) require access to more high-level contextual information about concepts.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 54%

Hemispheric lateralization of semantic feature distinctiveness

2015

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Recent models of semantic memory propose that the semantic representation of concepts is based, in part, on a network of features. In this view, a feature that is distinctive for an object (a zebra has stripes) is processed differently from a feature that is shared across many objects (a zebra has four legs). The goal of this paper is to determine whether there are hemispheric differences in such processing. In a feature verification task, participants responded ‘yes’ or ‘no’ following concepts which were presented to a single visual field (left or right) paired with a shared or distinctive feature. Both hemispheres showed faster reaction times to shared features than to distinctive features, although right hemisphere responses were significantly slower overall and particularly in the processing of distinctive features. These findings support models of semantic processing in which the dominant left hemisphere more efficiently performs highly discriminating ‘fine’ encoding, in contrast to the right hemisphere which performs less discriminating ‘coarse’ encoding.

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“…For known methodological reasons, brain-imaging methods are not always appropriate for the study of inter-hemispheric relations. Still, more general studies of brain functional asymmetry also argue for an important role for the RH in different aspects of speech processing (e.g., Chernigovskaya & Deglin, 1986;Deacon et al, 2004;Hutchinson, Whitman, Abeare, & Raiter, 2003). For the LH, the regional organization of language in the brain has been discussed at length in the literature, and most of the assumptions made can be accommodated by the sequential stream described in the model (e.g., Friederici, 2002;Hickok & Poeppel, 2004;Vigneau et al, 2006).…”

Section: Neurocognitive Empirical Supportmentioning

confidence: 99%

Activation–verification in continuous speech processing: Interaction of cognitive strategies as a possible theoretical approach

Strelnikov

2008

Journal of Neurolinguistics

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Evidence for a New Conceptualization of Semantic Representation in the Left and Right Cerebral Hemispheres

Cited by 53 publications

References 31 publications

The effects of context, meaning frequency, and associative strength on semantic selection: Distinct contributions from each cerebral hemisphere

The effects of context, meaning frequency, and associative strength on semantic selection: Distinct contributions from each cerebral hemisphere

Hemispheric lateralization of semantic feature distinctiveness

Activation–verification in continuous speech processing: Interaction of cognitive strategies as a possible theoretical approach

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