N DE短语中隐喻的N400效应和半球偏爱：ERP研究
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The N400 Effect and Hemisphere Preference in
Metaphors in Chinese DE Phrases: An ERP Study
Pei Su
1
, Minghu Jiang
1
, Chen Bai
2
1
Lab of Computational Linguistics, School of Humanities, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
2
School of Foreign Language and Literature, Tianjin University, Tianjin, 300000, China
supei123@163.com, jiang.mh@tsinghua.edu.cn
Abstract— The processing of metaphors in the pattern “A
的
B” in Chinese was examined using the event related potentials
(ERPs). In this study, ERPs were recorded when 24 participants
read sentences with literal, metaphor or anomalous meanings
towards the same critical word. The result shows that metaphor
in “A
的
B” pattern can also evoke a larger N400 compared with
the literal meaning. It suggests that the metaphoric interpretation
was more difficult even with the similar familiarity in this pattern.
Another finding suggests that the N400 effect mainly distributed
in central and left hemisphere, which contradict to some of the
previous studies. We suggest that both hemispheres may sensitive
to metaphorical meaning but the left hemisphere was stimulated
around 400ms. Further studies are needed to give more evidence
to the hemisphere preference in Chinese metaphor compression.
Keywords— metaphor; ERP; Chinese; semantics
I. INTRODUCTION
Over centuries, metaphor have been considered a figure of
speech that use a figurative way to make words more vivid in
literature. One of the most commonly cited examples of a
metaphor in English is Shakespeare’s lines from As You Like
It:
All the world's a stage
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances[...]
We all know that the world is not literally a stage. By
asserting that the world is a stage, Shakespeare uses this
metaphor between the world and the stage to convey an
understanding about how the world functioning and the
behavior of people within it. This metaphor involves
recruitment of an analogy between the source domain of the
stage in the theatre and the target domain of the world. In this
analogy, people maps onto the players on the stage, indicating
that each one of us is just a tiny role of the huge whole world’s
play.
Although metaphors are most commonly used in literary
venues, linguists have discovered and shown that it is
pervasive in everyday language. Metaphors are used to
express a wide range of subjects, including abstract concepts
such as time and progress, emotions such as anger and love,
and taboo topics such as sex and death (Lakoff and Johnson,
1980). It is also a basic mean of extending existing word
meanings (Sweetser, 1990). It is similar within Chinese. For
example, when we say “
道路
” (dao4-lu4, road), literaly it
refers the the road that transport goods and people to their
directions, like in “
城市的道路
” (cheng2-shi4-de-dao4-lu4,
roads in the city). However, when we say “
人生的道路
”
(ren2-sheng1-de-dao4-lu4, roads of life), “
道路
” refers to the
journey of our life. The baby times maps onto the beginning of
road, and the later times maps onto the end of a road.
Over decades, neuropsychologists agreed that metaphor
comprehension is different from other language abilities. They
considered that there would be differences across brain
regions, and the right hemisphere (RH) is believed to be most
relevant to metaphor comprehension (Seana and Cyma, 2007).
More evidences supporting the RH theory was shown in
medical sciences. A number of patient studies in medical
fields states that focal lesions in the left and right hemisphere
have different effects on a patient’s ability to comprehend
metaphorical language. Brownell’s study in 1984 and 1988
shows that if the patient has a left hemisphere-damaged (LHD)
situation, they would prefer the metaphoric meaning of
adjectives. On the contrary, if the patient has a right
hemisphere-damaged (RHD) situation, they would prefer the
literal meaning of adjectives (Brownell, 1984, 1988).
Seana and Cyma did experiments exploring ERP
metaphoricity effects. They suggest that metaphoricals elicited
more negative ERPs during the timeframe of the N400 and
afterwards. They also claim that ERP metaphoricity effects
were very similar across hemifields, suggesting that the
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