Pre-attentive phonotactic processing

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Thomas Jacobsen
• Subject Area: General and Comparative Linguistics, Experimental Linguistics, Typology, Non-European Languages
• Term: from 2006 to 2014
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 25227870

This research program connects cognitive neuroscience with linguistic phonological theory. It applies cognitive neuroscientific investigation of event-related potentials (ERP), using mismatch negativitity (MMN) paradigms, to phonotactic restrictions that stem from the phonological constraint of Dorsal Fricative Assimilation in German. Special attention is given to the question of the (psychologically) pre-attentive status of phonotactic processing, which meets with the (linguistic) expectation that linguistic competence is put to use without a conscious effort. In cross-linguistic experimental protocols using identical stimulation for both language groups, the effects of Dorsal Fricative Assimilation in speakers of Standard German are investigated in comparison with speakers of Swiss German, with no active constraint of Dorsal Fricative Assimilation. The experiments investigate the effects of the phonological constraint in pre-attentive processing, the relevance of lexical access for these effects, and the occurrence of frequency effects in this connection.

• DFG Programme: Priority Programmes
• Subproject of: SPP 1234: Phonological and Phonetic Competence: Between Grammar, Signal Processing and Neural Activity
• Participating Person: Professor Hubert Truckenbrodt, Ph.D.