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Abstract：
Although many studies document the role of propositional truth-value in human psychological reading behavior, there is a relative paucity of research examining the role of differential propositional truth-value in processing Chinese counterfactual conditionals. This study is to investigate the role of differential propositional value in processing Chinese counterfactual conditionals by means of ERPs (event-related potentials). The study is based on comprehending two types of Chinese counterfactual conditionals, which is propositional truth value introduced by two different markers of conditional conjunctions in the protasis and apodosis, such as true counterfactual conditional markers jiaru (if) & jiu (so) in the sentence wo xiang yu jiaru you tui jiu keyi zai shuixia zhixi (I think if fish had legs so they could stifle under water), and false counterfactual conditional markers ruguo (if) & namo (then) in the sentence wo xiang gou ruguo you lin namo keyi zai shuixia huxi (I think if dogs had scales, then they could breathe under water). Two counterfactual propositional values (i.e. true and false propositional values) are constructed through manipulating sentence counterfactuality between the true and false counterfactual conditional markers in the protasis and the apodosis. Twenty-four full-time Chinese college students participated in the ERP study. The results demonstrated that processing the true counterfactual propositional sentences with conditional markers jiaru (if) & jiu (so) elicited the N400 effect relative to false propositional sentences with conditional markers ruguo (if) & namo (then). Moreover, the counterfactual sentences with true propositional conditions varied from the elicitation of the N400 effect in the protasis and absence of the N400 effect in the apodosis, showing that semantic roles may gradually disappear under the impact of truth value of propositional counterfactual condition, and/or the roles of semantic anomaly was eliminated in the accumulated sentence processing. While for the false counterfactual conditional sentences, elicitations of P300 in the protasis and robust N400 effect in the apodosis were shown, indicating the increasing semantic role in the processing. Interestingly, there was the absence of the P600 effect for processing sentences with syntactic violation, suggesting little extra syntactic cost in processing sentences with false propositional condition.
摘要：
尽管许多研究记录了命题真值在人类心理阅读行为中的作用，关于差分命题真值在处理中国反事实条件中的作用的研究相对缺乏。本研究旨在探讨差分命题值在通过事件相关电位（ERP）处理中国反事实条件中的作用。这项研究是基于理解两种类型的中国反事实条件，这是两种不同的条件连接标记在protasis和apodosis中引入的命题真值，如句子中的真反事实条件标记嘉如(if)&jiu(so)wo香yu嘉如你tuijiujiukeyizaishuixiazhify(我认为如果鱼有腿,它们可以在水下窒息),和错误的反事实条件标记如果（如果）和namo（那么）在句子中wo香沟如果你林namokeyizaishuixiahuxi（我认为如果狗有鳞片，然后他们可以在水下呼吸)。通过操纵protasis和apodosis中的真和假反事实条件标记之间的句子反事实，构造了两个反事实命题值（即真和假命题值）。24名全日制中国大学生参加了ERP研究。结果表明，使用条件标记jiaru（if）和jiu（so）处理真实的反事实命题句子会引起相对于使用条件标记ruguo（if）和namo（then）的错误命题句子的N400效应。此外，具有真实命题条件的反事实句子与原虫中N400效应的启发和自拟中N400效应的缺失不同，表明语义角色可能在命题反事实条件真值的影响下逐渐消失，和/或语义异常在累积句子处理中的作用被消除。而对于虚假的反事实条件句，显示了P300在protasis中的激发和N400在apodosis中的强大作用，表明语义在处理中的作用越来越大。有趣的是,没有P600效应来处理句法违反的句子，这表明在处理具有虚假命题条件的句子时几乎没有额外的句法成本。
