Memory-related brain potentials for visual objects in early AD show impairment and compensatory mechanisms.

Impaired episodic memory is the primary feature of early Alzheimer's disease (AD), but not all memories are equally affected. Patients with AD and amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment (aMCI) remember pictures better than words, to a greater extent than healthy elderly. We investigated neural mechanisms for visual object recognition in 30 patients (14 AD, 16 aMCI) and 36 cognitively unimpaired healthy (19 in the "preclinical" stage of AD).

Flexible Conceptual Representations.

A view that has been gaining prevalence over the past decade is that the human conceptual system is malleable, dynamic, context-dependent, and task-dependent, that is, flexible. Within the flexible conceptual representation framework, conceptual representations are constructed ad hoc, forming a different, idiosyncratic instantiation upon each occurrence. In this review, we scrutinize the neurocognitive literature to better understand the nature of this flexibility.

Nuances of knowing: Brain potentials reveal implicit effects of domain knowledge on word processing in the absence of sentence-level knowledge.

In previous work investigating the relationship between domain knowledge (of the fictional world of Harry Potter) and sentence comprehension, domain knowledge had a greater impact on electrical brain potentials to words which completed sentences about fictional "facts" participants reported they did not know compared to facts they did. This suggests that individuals use domain knowledge continuously to activate relevant/related concepts as they process sentences, even with only partial knowledge. As that study relied on subjective reports, it may have resulted in response bias related to an individual's overall domain knowledge.

Offline dominance and zeugmatic similarity normings of variably ambiguous words assessed against a neural language model (BERT).

For any research program examining how ambiguous words are processed in broader linguistic contexts, a first step is to establish factors relating to the frequency balance or dominance of those words' multiple meanings, as well as the similarity of those meanings to one other. Homonyms-words with divergent meanings-are one ambiguous word type commonly utilized in psycholinguistic research. In contrast, although polysemes-words with multiple related senses-are far more common in English, they have been less frequently used as tools for understanding one-to-many word-to-meaning mappings.

Wrong or right? Brain potentials reveal hemispheric asymmetries to semantic relations during word-by-word sentence reading as a function of (fictional) knowledge.

How does individual-level variation in experience and knowledge influence neural mechanisms important for real-time language comprehension? We used event-related brain potentials (ERPs) combined with lateralized visual field (VF) presentation of sentence-final words to examine asymmetries in hemispheric processing as individuals who varied in their knowledge of the fictional world of Harry Potter (HP) read sentences about general topics and HP. HP sentence endings were either contextually supported, unrelated anomalies, or semantically related anomalies. Amongst HP experts, we observed contextual support effects with presentation to both left and right VFs, but related anomaly effects only with presentation to the left VF (right hemisphere).

To catch a Snitch: Brain potentials reveal variability in the functional organization of (fictional) world knowledge during reading.

We harnessed the temporal sensitivity of event-related brain potentials (ERPs) alongside individual differences in Harry Potter (HP) knowledge to investigate the extent to which the availability and timing of information relevant for real-time written word processing are influenced by variation in domain knowledge. We manipulated meaningful (category, event) relationships between sentence fragments about HP stories and their sentence final words. During word-by-word reading, N400 amplitudes to (a) linguistically supported and (b) unsupported but meaningfully related, but not to (c) unsupported, unrelated sentence endings varied with HP domain knowledge.

Event-related potential and EEG oscillatory predictors of verbal memory in mild cognitive impairment.

Reliable biomarkers of memory decline are critical for the early detection of Alzheimer's disease. Previous work has found three EEG measures, namely the event-related brain potential P600, suppression of oscillatory activity in the alpha frequency range (∼10 Hz) and cross-frequency coupling between low theta/high delta and alpha/beta activity, each of which correlates strongly with verbal learning and memory abilities in healthy elderly and patients with mild cognitive impairment or prodromal Alzheimer's disease. In the present study, we address the question of whether event-related or oscillatory measures, or a combination thereof, best predict the decline of verbal memory in mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease.

Testing limits: ERP evidence for word form preactivation during speeded sentence reading.

While it is commonly agreed upon that language comprehenders preactivate information at multiple levels, there is less consensus regarding what and when information is predicted, under which circumstances, and via which mechanism(s). Regarding when, Ito, Corley, Pickering, Martin, & Nieuwland (2016) concluded that during sentence processing, word form-unlike semantic-preactivation crucially relies on the time available to generate late-stage predictions via language production mechanisms, setting this limit between 500 and 700 ms/word. The current event-related brain potential (ERP) study tests this proposal at a substantially faster serial visual presentation (SVP) rate of four words/s, on par with normal reading.

The Role of Glutamate in Language and Language Disorders - Evidence from ERP and Pharmacologic Studies.

Current models of language processing do not address mechanisms at the neurotransmitter level, nor how pharmacologic agents may improve language function(s) in seemingly disparate disorders. L-Glutamate, the primary excitatory neurotransmitter in the human brain, is extensively involved in various higher cortical functions. We postulate that the physiologic role of L-Glutamate neurotransmission extends to the regulation of language access, comprehension, and production, and that disorders in glutamatergic transmission and circuitry contribute to the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative diseases and sporadic-onset language disorders such as the aphasic stroke syndromes.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of ?: The impact of what individuals know on word processing during reading.

During reading, effects of contextual support indexed by N400-a brain potential sensitive to semantic activation/retrieval-amplitude are presumably mediated by comprehenders' world knowledge. Moreover, variability in knowledge may influence the contents, timing, and mechanisms of what is brought to mind during real-time sentence processing. Since it is infeasible to assess the entirety of each individual's knowledge, we investigated a limited domain-the narrative world of Harry Potter (HP).

An exploratory data analysis of word form prediction during word-by-word reading.

In 2005, we reported evidence indicating that upcoming phonological word forms-e.g., vs.

Comprehending surprising sentences: sensitivity of post-N400 positivities to contextual congruity and semantic relatedness.

Any proposal for predictive language comprehension must address receipt of less expected information. While a relationship between the N400 and sentence predictability is well established, a clear picture is still emerging of the link between post-N400 positivities (PNPs) and processing of semantically unexpected words, as well as any relation to other not-specifically-linguistic and/or syntactic late positivities. The current study employs event-related brain potentials (ERPs) to congruent and anomalous words to assess the impacts of semantic relatedness and contextual plausibility on processing unpredictable sentences.

Emanuel Donchin (1935-2018).

This article memorializes Emanuel Donchin (1935-2018). Emanuel's greatest scientific impact was to pioneer the field of cognitive electrophysiology. He was an early practitioner of cognitive science, bringing together cognitive event-related potentials (ERPs) and investigators from other disciplines at twelve "Carmel" workshops from 1979 to 1992.

What's "left"? Hemispheric sensitivity to predictability and congruity during sentence reading by older adults.

A number of studies have found that older adults' sentence processing tends not to be characterized by the prediction-related effects attested for young adults. Here, we further probed older adults' sensitivity to predictability and congruity by recording event-related brain potentials (ERPs) as adults over age 60 read pairs of sentences, which ended with either the expected word, an unexpected word from the same semantic category, or an unexpected word from a different category. Half of the contexts were highly constraining.

Lumos!: Electrophysiological tracking of (wizarding) world knowledge use during reading.

In Troyer and Kutas (2018), individual differences in knowledge of the world of Harry Potter (HP) rapidly modulated individuals' average electrical brain potentials to contextually supported words in sentence endings. Using advances in single-trial electroencephalogram analysis, we examined whether this relationship is strictly a result of domain knowledge mediating the proportion of facts each participant knew; we find it is not. Participants read sentences ending in a contextually supported word, reporting online whether they had known each fact.

Similar time courses for word form and meaning preactivation during sentence comprehension.

Current psycholinguistic research generally acknowledges that aspects of sentence comprehension benefit from neural preactivation of different types of information. However, despite strong support from a number of studies, routine specific word form preactivation has been challenged by Ito, Corley, Pickering, Martin, and Nieuwland (2016). They suggest that word form prediction is contingent upon having enough processing time and resources (afforded by slower input rates) to progress through unidirectional, productionlike stages of comprehension to arrive at word forms via semantic feature preactivation.

Uncanny valley as a window into predictive processing in the social brain.

Uncanny valley refers to humans' negative reaction to almost-but-not-quite-human agents. Theoretical work proposes prediction violation as an explanation for uncanny valley but no empirical work has directly tested it. Here, we provide evidence that supports this theory using event-related brain potential recordings from the human scalp.

Not so secret agents: Event-related potentials to semantic roles in visual event comprehension.

Research across domains has suggested that agents, the doers of actions, have a processing advantage over patients, the receivers of actions. We hypothesized that agents as "event builders" for discrete actions (e.g.

Projectors, associators, visual imagery, and the time course of visual processing in grapheme-color synesthesia.

In grapheme-color synesthesia, seeing particular letters or numbers evokes the experience of specific colors. We investigate the brain's real-time processing of words in this population by recording event-related brain potentials (ERPs) from 15 grapheme-color synesthetes and 15 controls as they judged the validity of word pairs ('yellow banana' vs. 'blue banana') presented under high and low visual contrast.

What is your neural function, visual narrative conjunction? Grammar, meaning, and fluency in sequential image processing.

Visual narratives sometimes depict successive images with different characters in the same physical space; corpus analysis has revealed that this occurs more often in Japanese manga than American comics. We used event-related brain potentials to determine whether comprehension of "visual narrative conjunctions" invokes not only incremental mental updating as traditionally assumed, but also, as we propose, "grammatical" combinatoric processing. We thus crossed (non)/conjunction sequences with character (in)/congruity.

Abnormal self-schema in semantic memory in major depressive disorder: Evidence from event-related brain potentials.

An overly negative self-schema is a proposed cognitive mechanism of major depressive disorder (MDD). Self-schema - one's core conception of self, including how strongly one believes one possesses various characteristics - is part of semantic memory (SM), our knowledge about concepts and their relationships. We used the N400 event-related potential (ERP) - elicited by meaningful stimuli, and reduced by greater association of the stimulus with preceding context - to measure association strength between self-concept and positive, negative, and neutral characteristics in SM.

When a hit sounds like a kiss: An electrophysiological exploration of semantic processing in visual narrative.

Researchers have long questioned whether information presented through different sensory modalities involves distinct or shared semantic systems. We investigated uni-sensory cross-modal processing by recording event-related brain potentials to words replacing the climactic event in a visual narrative sequence (comics). We compared Onomatopoeic words, which phonetically imitate action sounds (Pow!), with Descriptive words, which describe an action (Punch!), that were (in)congruent within their sequence contexts.

Hemispheric differences and similarities in comprehending more and less predictable sentences.

With a growing literature demonstrating the predictive nature of language processing, the current study examines contributions of the brain's two hemispheres in processing more and less probable sentence continuations. Specifically, we use the ERP method in conjunction with the visual half-field paradigm to test for hemispheric utilization of sentential constraint to (pre-)activate lexical information and resolve meaning. Taking advantage of the N400's semantic sensitivities, we find support for both hemispheres exhibiting remarkably similar involvement, across a range of message level constraint, in meaning construction.

Elaboration over a Discourse Facilitates Retrieval in Sentence Processing.

Language comprehension requires access to stored knowledge and the ability to combine knowledge in new, meaningful ways. Previous work has shown that processing linguistically more complex expressions ('Texas cattle rancher' vs. 'rancher') leads to slow-downs in reading during initial processing, possibly reflecting effort in combining information.

Hemispheric asymmetry in event knowledge activation during incremental language comprehension: A visual half-field ERP study.

During incremental language comprehension, the brain activates knowledge of described events, including knowledge elements that constitute semantic anomalies in their linguistic context. The present study investigates hemispheric asymmetries in this process, with the aim of advancing our understanding of the neural basis and functional properties of event knowledge activation during incremental comprehension. In a visual half-field event-related brain potential (ERP) experiment, participants read brief discourses in which the third sentence contained a word that was either highly expected, semantically anomalous but related to the described event (Event-Related), or semantically anomalous but unrelated to the described event (Event-Unrelated).