Enough time to get results? An ERP investigation of prediction with complex events

How quickly can verb-argument relations be computed to impact predictions of a subsequent argument? We take advantage of the substantial differences in verb-argument structure provided by Mandarin, whose compound verbs encode complex event relations, such as resultatives (<i>Kid bit-broke lip</i>: the kid bit his lip such that it broke) and coordinates (<i>Store owner hit-scolded employee</i>: the store owner hit and scolded an employee). We tested sentences in which the object noun could be predicted on the basis of the preceding compound verb, and used N400 responses to the noun to index successful prediction. By varying the delay between verb and noun, we show that prediction is delayed in the resultative context (<i>broken-BY-biting</i>) relative to the coordinate one (<i>hitting-AND-scolding</i>). These results present a first step towards temporally dissociating the fine-grained subcomputations required to parse and interpret verb-argument relations.