There is substantial evidence that affectively charged words (e.g., party or gun) are processed differently from neutral words (e.g., pen), although there are also inconsistent findings in the field. Some lexical or semantic variables might explain such inconsistencies, due to the possible modulation of affective word processing by these variables. The aim of the present study was to examine the extent to which affective word processing is modulated by semantic ambiguity. We conducted a large lexical decision study including semantically ambiguous words (e.g., cataract) and semantically unambiguous words (e.g., terrorism), analyzing the extent to which reaction times (RTs) were influenced by their affective properties. The findings revealed a valence effect in which positive valence made RTs faster while negative valence slowed them. The valence effect diminished as the semantic ambiguity of words increased. This decrease did not affect all ambiguous words, but was observed mainly in ambiguous words with incongruent affective meanings. These results highlight the need to consider the affective properties of the distinct meanings of ambiguous words in research on affective word processing.

中文翻译：

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表达：歧义词识别中的情感效应：歧义词的不同含义之间的情感一致性的关键作用。

有大量证据表明，情绪激动的词（例如，派对或枪）与中性词（例如，笔）的处理方式不同，尽管该领域也有不一致的发现。由于这些变量可能对情感文字处理进行调制，因此一些词汇或语义变量可能会解释这种不一致。本研究的目的是检查语义歧义对情感文字处理的调节程度。我们进行了一项大型词汇决策研究，包括语义模糊的词（例如，白内障）和语义明确的词（例如，恐怖主义），分析反应时间 (RT) 受其情感特性影响的程度。研究结果揭示了价效应，其中正价使 RTs 更快，而负价使它们减慢。随着单词语义歧义的增加，效价效应减弱。这种减少并未影响所有歧义词，但主要在情感意义不一致的歧义词中观察到。这些结果突出了在情感词处理研究中考虑歧义词的不同含义的情感特性的必要性。