Objective: To study the ERP old/new effects during a recognition task for Chinese words.
Method: Twenty one healthy right-handed volunteers received a Chinese words recognition task. The stimuli were meaningful words consisting of two Chinese characters. The EEG signals were recorded from 9 scalp sites of the extended 10-20 systems.
Result: Compared with the new words, the old words elicited larger N320 (the frontal old/new effect) at the frontal brain areas and larger LPC (the parietal old/new effect) at the parietal brain areas. And the peak of LPC appeared significantly earlier in old words ERPs than in new words ERPs.
Conclusion: The old/new effect is significant for the recognition of Chinese words, which also consists of the frontal old/new effect and the parietal old/new effect. The parietal old/new effect is positive-going, but the frontal old/new effect is negative-going. The frontal old/new effect might be affected by the language and material.