Neurocognitive Mechanisms Underlying the Processing of Pragmatic Implicatures in Bilingual Speakers: An ERP and fMRI Data Analysis Study

Abstract

This research explains the process of processing pragmatic implicatures by bilingual speakers based in event-related potentials (ERP) and functional MRI (fMMRI). The test is conducted on bilingual adults with an implicature comprehension task in which they are presented with implicature-inducing sentences and corresponding literal/control sentences. ERP measures test time course of pragmatic inference (e.g. N400 and late positivities), whereas fMRI is used to identify brain networks engaged in deriving implied meaning (e.g., inferior frontal, temporal and temporo-parietal areas). We also hypothesize that implicatures would incur a higher processing cost than literal interpretations and neural timing (ERP) and activation patterns (fMRI) will be altered depending on individual differences in L2 proficiency and language dominance.