title: Morphemic ambiguity resolution in Chinese: activation of the subordinate meaning with a prior dominant-biased context.
abstract: In the present study, we examined how morphemic ambiguity is resolved using the visual-world paradigm. Participants were presented with Chinese bimorphemic words containing an ambiguous morpheme (analogous to the suffix -er in teacher and taller) and performed a visual search task. Their eye-movement patterns during target detection showed that (1) without a prior context, the dominant meaning of an ambiguous morpheme was more available than the subordinate one; (2) with a dominant-biased prior context, the subordinate meaning was still activated; and (3) a subordinate-biased prior context could inhibit the dominant interpretation. Therefore, both the frequency of the intended meaning and the prior contextual biases play a role in morphemic ambiguity resolution. The results are discussed with reference to models of ambiguity resolution and recent proposals of the graded nature of morphological effects.
authors.affiliation: Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, NT, Hong Kong. yktsang@psy.cuhk.edu.hk
authors.forename: Yiu-Kei
authors.initials: YK
authors.lastname: Tsang
authors.forename: Hsuan-Chih
authors.initials: HC
authors.lastname: Chen
mesh_terms: D001307:Auditory Perception; D002681:China; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological; D005133:Eye Movements; D005403:Fixation, Ocular; D005556:Form Perception; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D010700:Phonetics; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics