title: An ERP study of inhibition of non-target languages in trilingual word production.
abstract: The present study examined the locus where inhibition of non-target languages is exerted during trilingual word production by analyzing the cue-locked and stimulus-locked ERPs respectively in the n-2 language repetition paradigm. During the experiment, Uighur-Chinese-English trilinguals overtly named Arabic digits in one of their three languages according to a visually presented cue while their behavioral and electrophysiological responses were recorded. The behavioral data revealed insignificant n-2 repetition costs. Cue-locked ERPs revealed also only tiny or marginally significant n-2 repetition effects over some midline electrodes. The stimulus-locked ERP data showed a more negative ERP component elicited by the n-2 repetition trials than the n-2 non-repetition trials around 250 ms after stimulus onset, but no significant difference in this ERP effect between different languages was found. The results indicate that inhibition of non-target languages occurs at the lemma selection phase rather than the language task schemas phase during trilingual language production.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning, Beijing Normal University, PR China. Electronic address: guotm@bnu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Taomei
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.forename: Fengyang
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.forename: Fengqin
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Liu
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D003463:Cues; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D007802:Language; D008297:Male; D019303:Multilingualism; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D013060:Speech / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: ERP; Inhibitory control; Language production; Trilingual; n-2 Repetition cost