On 23 April, Carolin Dudschig from Universität Tübingen will talk about The N400 and Large Language Models: Prediction- vs. count-based methods
Time: 13:15
On site: SOL A158
Zoom Link: https://lu-se.zoom.us/j/62491331134
Abstract:
The N400 is a well-established event-related potential (ERP) component
that is widely studied in the field of cognitive neuroscience. It is
typically larger following the detection of a semantic violation or
other incongruities within language processing tasks. The N400
provides valuable insights into the cognitive processes underlying
language comprehension. For example, it has been used to investigate
whether linguistic and world-knowledge violations are integrated in
parallel during comprehension (e.g., Dudschig, Maienborn & Kaup, 2016;
Hagoort, Bastiaansen & Petersson, 2004). Nevertheless, to date, it is
still under debate what processes or information are reflected in the
N400 and whether integration of basic operators such as negation are
reflected in the N400 (e.g., Dudschig et al., 2019). The accounts
range from integration views - suggesting the N400 reflects
integration processes - to the lexical view - suggesting that the N400
is non-combinatorial in nature and dominant prediction-based accounts
that focus on the predictability of the critical word (for a review,
see Kutas & Federmeier, 2011). Recent developments in large language
models (LLMs) have opened new avenues to investigate what processes
are reflected and what insights can be gained from examining the N400.
This presentation aims to investigate the extent to which the N400
amplitude can be better explained by pre-determined discrete condition
labels (e.g., correct vs. world-knowledge vs. semantic violation)
versus continuous word-pair embedding measures derived from multiple
LLMs. Overall, this presentation aims to bridge the gap between
traditional N400 research and the emerging field of natural language
modeling.
Dudschig, C., Mackenzie, I. G., Maienborn, C., Kaup, B., & Leuthold,
H. (2019). Negation and the N400: Investigating temporal aspects of
negation integration using semantic and world-knowledge violations.
Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 34(3), 309-319.
Dudschig, C., Maienborn, C., & Kaup, B. (2016). Is there a difference
between stripy journeys and stripy ladybirds? The N400 response to
semantic and world-knowledge violations during sentence processing.
Brain and Cognition, 103, 38-49.
Hagoort, P., Hald, L., Bastiaansen, M., & Petersson, K. M. (2004).
Integration of word meaning and world knowledge in language
comprehension. Science, 304(5669), 438-441.
Kutas, M., & Federmeier, K. D. (2011). Thirty years and counting:
finding meaning in the N400 component of the event-related brain
potential (ERP). Annual Review of Psychology, 62, 621-647.