Semantic and Phonological Prediction in Language Comprehension: Pretarget Attraction Toward Semantic and Phonological Competitors in a Mouse Tracking Task

Recent evidence increasingly suggests that comprehenders are capable of generating probabilistic predictions about forthcoming linguistic inputs during language comprehension. However, it remains debated whether language comprehenders predict low-level word forms and whether they always make predictions. In this study, we investigated semantic and phonological prediction in high- and low-constraining sentence contexts, utilizing the mouse-tracking paradigm to trace mouse movement trajectories. Mandarin Chinese speakers listened to high- and low-constraining sentences which resulted in high and low predictability for the critical target words. While listening, participants viewed a visual display featuring two objects: one corresponding to the critical target word (the target object) and the other being either semantically related, phonologically related, or unrelated to the target word. Participants were instructed to click on the target object. The analysis of mouse movement trajectories revealed two key findings: (1) In both high- and low-constraining contexts, there was a spatial attraction of the cursor toward semantic competitors, notably occurring before the target word was heard; (2) there are indications that phonological pretarget attraction effects were observed primarily in high-constraining contexts. These findings suggest that the constraints of sentences have the potential to modulate the representational contents of linguistic prediction during language comprehension. Methodologically, the mouse-tracking paradigm presents a promising tool for further exploration of linguistic prediction.