Semantic effects in the Attentional Blink: Relatedness proportion modulates the P2 and the N400 component of the event-related potentials.

Three target words (T1, T2, T3) were presented in a RSVP sequence and participants were required to report the targets at the end of the trial. T1-T2 lag was about 300 ms so that T2 was often missed (blinked) whereas T1 and T3 were almost correctly reported. In a ERP study under such conditions, Pesciarelli, et al. (2007) observed a semantic modulation of the T3-locked P2 component that was independent on the correct report of T2 and a semantic effect on the T3-locked N400 that was detected only when T2 was not blinked. The present study is aimed at exploring how these semantic effects are modulated by the context. The experimental items were mixed with filler items containing T2-T3 related pairs in one condition, and T2-T3 unrelated pairs in the other condition. The results showed that both the P2 and the N400 semantic effects were modulated by the context and independent (i.e. either one effect, or the other, or both, or none, were observed): The N400 effect for T2-reported trials was wider in the related-filler than in the unrelated-filler context whereas the P2 effect was present only in the unrelated-filler context and independent on the correct report of T2.