Time-course and localization of syntactic and semantic anomaly in sentence processing: a within-subjects fMRI/MEG design

Determining source location could potentially allow more fine-grained distinctions between functional interpretations of ERP components, but the problem remains difficult. Methodologies which provide more localization information (fMRI, intracranial recordings, MEG, patient studies) give results which often seem incommensurate. In this study we combine two of these methodologies, fMRI and MEG, in the same participants, using the same paradigm, in an attempt to gain more insight on the source and timecourse of responses to syntactic and semantic anomaly. fMRI can provide more accurate information about the location of activity, while MEG can provide more accurate information about the timecourse of activity. We also review the previous literature on the processing of semantic and syntactic anomaly using various methodologies, and we provide a meta-analysis of fMRI studies of semantic priming, and semantic and syntactic anomaly. We conclude that the combination of information from such methodologies is informative, but remains subject to considerable limitations of interpretation.