Abstraktit - Oulu

89. LEINONEN, ALINA – ELECTROPHYSIOLOGICAL
CORRELATES OF DERIVATIONAL AND INFLECTIONAL
MORPHOLOGY
Psykologian laitos, kognitiotiede, Helsingin yliopisto
Asiasanat:
One of the most persistent problems in morphology has been the distinction
between derivational and inflectional morphology. Results from several eventrelated
potential (ERP) studies suggest that regular inflection elicits different brain
potentials than irregular inflection. However, no EEG studies have been conducted
on derivational morphology or on the relationship between inflectional and
derivational processing. The aim of the current study was to investigate the
electrophysiological correlates of inflection and derivation. We recorded ERP
(event-related potential) responses while subjects were presented visually sentences
in which inflectional and/or derivational rules of Finnish were violated; e.g. a)
”Mies, joka omistaa talot, on talollinen mies (control); b) ”Mies, joka juoksee, on
*juoksellinen mies” (derivational violation); c) ”Mies, joka omistaa talon, on
*talolliset (PL) mies” (inflectional violation); d) ”Mies, joka juoksee, on
*juokselliset (PL) mies (both violations). The phonemic length of the critical words
was controlled. Derivational violation elicited an N400-like component. Both
inflectional and derivational violations elicited a parietal P600 component peaking
at ~653 ms and ~693 ms, respectively. We propose that in the derivational violation
condition, the critical word (*juoksellinen) is not found in the lexicon and the word
is judged as ungrammatical, eliciting the N400 component. It might take more time
to process the ungrammatical word and try to integrate it with the rest of the
sentence. In the inflectional condition, the word is found in the lexicon (*talolliset
mies) and thus it takes less time to correct the impaired form and integrate the word
with the whole sentence. The electrophysiological observations are discussed with
respect to behavioral results of the current study.
Lähteet:
KIELITIETEEN PÄIVÄT 24.–25.5.2007 152 / 155
OULU