Abstract: Linguistic context,also known as contextual context,affects the temporary construction of words’ meaning.At present,the construction of lexical meaning in specific context is an important research content of Cognitive Semantics and Lexical Pragmatics,and scholars have carried out theoretical research.The N400 index in ERP mainly identifies semantic violation,and as a specific component of semantic violation,it can be used to study the construction of contextual meaning.In this study,the same word is placed in the context of literal orientation and metaphorical orientation respectively,and the cognitive mechanism of lexical pragmatic information is explored through the analysis of semantic sensitive component N400.Compared with the real-time N400 index changes of the testees,the N400 effect is not obvious in the context of literal meaning orientation,and there is no obvious semantic violation.In the context of metaphorical meaning orientation,there is an obvious N400 effect after the keywords.The experiment shows that the activation of lexical pragmatic information in context is a dynamic cognitive process,and activating the metaphorical meaning of words requires more cognitive efforts.

Key words: context, semantic processing, Event-related Potential related potential(ERP), N400