Did you say brain or brave? Event-related potentials reveal the central role of phonological prediction in false hearing

In the current paper, we report the results from two event-related brain potential (ERP) experiments that examined the time-course of false hearing (i.e., hearing one word when a different one was presented). Target words were presented in background noise whereas the preceding context (either a semantic prime word or a constraining sentence) was not. Participants routinely experienced false hearing, reporting a predictable word when an incongruent, phonological lure was presented. We found that the N400 to falsely heard words was similar to when a predictable word was presented even though a phonological lure was presented. Additionally, the N400 response to correctly identified phonological lures was significantly delayed compared to the response to incongruent words that shared no phonological relation to predictable words, suggesting the listeners engaged in phonological prediction. Altogether, the findings from the current study provide evidence that listeners’ engagement in phonological prediction can lead to misperception.