The role of the right cerebral hemisphere in processing novel metaphoric expressions taken from poetry

Previous research suggeststhat the right hemisphere (RH) may contribute uniquely to the processing ofmetaphoric language. However, most studies have focused on familiar metaphoricexpressions. The present study used the divided visual field paradigm toexamine the role of the right cerebral hemisphere in processing novelmetaphoric expressions taken from poetry. In two experiments, participants werepresented with four types of word pairs, literal, conventional metaphoric and novelmetaphoric expressions and unrelated word pairs, and asked to perform asemantic judgment task. Two different SOAs: 400 and 1100 ms were used. Theresults of both experiments showed that responses to LVF/RH presented targetwords were more accurate and faster than responses to RVF/LH target words fornovel metaphoric expressions, but not for other types of word pairs. Theseresults support previous research indicating that during word recognition, theRH activates a broader range of related meanings than the LH, including novel,nonsalient meanings. The findings thus suggest that the RH may be criticallyinvolved in at least one important component of novel metaphor comprehension,i.e., the integration of the individual meanings of two seemingly unrelatedconcepts into a meaningful metaphoric expression.