English
 
Help Privacy Policy Disclaimer
  Advanced SearchBrowse

Item

ITEM ACTIONSEXPORT

Released

Journal Article

Syntactic parsing and working memory: The effects of syntactic complexity, reading span, and concurrent load

MPS-Authors
/persons/resource/persons19687

Gunter,  Thomas C.
MPI of Cognitive Neuroscience (Leipzig, -2003), The Prior Institutes, MPI for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons19643

Friederici,  Angela D.
MPI of Cognitive Neuroscience (Leipzig, -2003), The Prior Institutes, MPI for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Max Planck Society;

External Resource
No external resources are shared
Fulltext (restricted access)
There are currently no full texts shared for your IP range.
Fulltext (public)
There are no public fulltexts stored in PuRe
Supplementary Material (public)
There is no public supplementary material available
Citation

Vos, S. H., Gunter, T. C., Schriefers, H., & Friederici, A. D. (2001). Syntactic parsing and working memory: The effects of syntactic complexity, reading span, and concurrent load. Language and Cognitive Processes, 16(1), 65-103. doi:10.1080 /0169096004200008 5.


Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/11858/00-001M-0000-0010-DD76-F
Abstract
Event-relate d brain potential s (ERPs ) an d behavioura l measure s (reactio n time s an d errors ) were used to stud y the potentia l effect s of individua l difference s in verba l workin g memor y capacit y (low vs . high readin g span ) and a concurren t verba l workin g memor y loa d (lo w vs. hig h load) on th e processin g of sentence s wit h a loca l syntacti c ambiguit y in German . The sentence s wer e disambiguate d at the clause- Žnal auxiliar y to eithe r a subjec t relativ e (SR) claus e or to an objec t relativ e (OR ) clause . Th e processin g dif Žcult y fo r the OR as compare d to the SR clause s was reecte d in wors e off-lin e comprehensio n performance , particularl y for lo w span readers . Moreover , ERP s time-locke d to th e disambiguatin g auxiliar y showe d an earl y posterio r positivit y betwee n 200 –35 0 ms for OR clause s as compare d to SR clause s fo r high span readers . Lo w spa n readers , in contrast , showe d a late fronta l positivit y betwee n 500 and 800 ms. Whil e the early positivit y for high spa n reader s was independen t of th e concurren t load , th e late positivit y varie d as a functio n of concurren t load , being delaye d in th e hig h load condition . Thes e result s indicat e that syntacti c processe s in languag e comprehensio n are relate d to individua l difference s in parsin g strategies.