ArticleScientific reports2022
Semantic systems are mentalistically activated for and by social partners.
Article in Scientific reports, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
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Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed, 7 citations in OpenAlex.
- The Intriguingly Social N400 of Preverbal Infants.Developmental neurobiology · 2026Article
- Electrophysiological correlates of presuppositional inference in contrastive focus.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2026Article
- Neural time course of processing socially meaningful symbolic cues: ERP differences between national-symbol and neutral-object icons.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2026Article
- Performing a task with a friend does not change semantic processes but preparation: a social N400 and CNV event-related potential study.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Six-month-old infants use cross-modal synchrony to identify novel communicative signals.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Meaning as mentalization.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2024Review
- Unveiling the need of interactions for social N400s and supporting the N400 inhibition hypothesis.Scientific reports · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 4 institutions in 5 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
A recently discovered electrophysiological response, the social N400, suggests that we use our language system to track how social partners comprehend language. Listeners show an increased N400 response, when themselves not, only a communicative partner experiences a semantic incongruity. Does the N400 reflect purely semantic or mentalistic computations as well? Do we attribute language comprehension to communicative partners using our semantic systems? In five electrophysiological experiments we identified two subcomponents of the social N400. First, we manipulated the presence-absence of an Observer during object naming: the semantic memory system was activated by the presence of a social partner in addition to semantic predictions for the self. Next, we induced a false belief-and a consequent miscomprehension-in the Observer. Participants showed the social N400, over and above the social presence effect, to labels that were incongruent for the Observer, even though they were congruent for them. This effect appeared only if participants received explicit instructions to track the comprehension of the Observer. These findings suggest that the semantic systems of the brain are not merely sensitive to social information and contribute to the attribution of comprehension, but they appear to be mentalistic in nature.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.