The Eye Movement Studies On The Influence Of Conception Contrast On Semantic Integration

Language is everywhere in our life,successful semantic integration is an important part of language understanding.Previous studies have found that world knowledge and textual background may affect semantic integration,and the time process of semantic integration has two viewpoints of delayed-integration hypothesis and incrementally integrated.Based on these,this study attempts to explore three problems by using three eye movement experiments:(1)Does the comparison of conceptual categories based on world knowledge have an impact on the semantic integration?(2)Does the conception contrast which defined by text background affect the semantic integration?(3)Is the semantic integration process of conception contrast consistent with the delayed-integration hypothesis or incrementally integrated?In experiment 1,according to the common sense of life,the conceptions is divided into the same category and different categories,connected by "but",the complex sentences are formed,and the conceptions of the same category are contrasted and the conceptions of different categories are contrasted,and the influence of conceptual category contrast on semantic integration is explored.Experiment 2 divided the conceptions into the same category and different categories through textual background,and compared it by "but" connection.It further explored the influence of conceptual comparison on semantic integration under the condition of clear conceptual categories.In experiment 3,using "but" and antonymous contrastive words two ways of contrast,to manipulate the position of the target word,through the "but" contrast connection,setting the target word in the sentence,and in the way of using antonymous contrastive words,the target words is at the end of sentence,we explore whether the reader has another semantic integration in the last sentence area,and verify that the semantic integration process is consistent with the delayed-integration hypothesis or incrementally integrated,and further verify the effect of conception contrast on semantic integration.Research results are found:(1)The conception contrast based on the world knowledge affects the semantic integration.Under the conception contrast conditions of different categories,the reading time on keywords is significantly longer than that in the same category(appear spillover effect).(2)The conception contrast of text background defined category influences the semantic integration.Under the conception contrast conditions of different categories,the reading time on keywords is significantly longer than that in the same category,and the number of fixation is also significantly more than that of the same category.(3)When the target words are placed at the end of the sentence,there is almost no regression path reading time on the target words.Under the conception contrast conditions of different categories,the reading time on keywords is significantly longer than that in the same category,and number of fixations is also significantly more than that of the same category.The results show that whether the conceptual category is divided by the world knowledge or the the discourse background,the conception contrast influence semantic integration,different conceptual categories contrast compare with the same,its semantic integration more difficult;the reader didn't integrate at the end of the sentence again,and the semantic integration process is incrementally integrated.