Task-sensitive semantic-visual alignment of motion schema during incremental Mandarin sentence comprehension

Abstract

Language comprehension involves dynamically integrating linguistic input into coherent event representations. A common approach to investigating this process has been to examine behavioural congruency effects between linguistic and visual information. However, it remains unclear under what conditions these effects emerge and whether they reflect embodied processing or alternative cognitive mechanisms. The present study examined semantic-visual alignment of motion schema during incremental processing of Mandarin motion sentences, focusing on whether congruency effects are modulated by task demands and visual probe regions. 149 native Mandarin speakers completed either a self-paced sentence-diagram verification task or a self-paced sentence-diagram viewing task. In both tasks, participants processed segmented Chinese motion sentences, while schematic diagrams were presented either after the directional verb (e.g., jìn , ‘into’) or the landmark (e.g., bàn-gōng-shì , ‘office’). Results revealed overall congruency effects across tasks and diagram regions. Crucially, effects were stronger in the verification task than in the viewing task but remained stable across diagram regions. These findings suggest that semantic-visual alignment is sensitive to task demands but does not necessarily become stronger as the sentence unfolds. These congruency effects are open to both embodied and amodal semantic interpretations and are therefore not uniquely diagnostic of embodied processing.