Gender congruency effect across the animacy hierarchy and its neural correlates.

The aim of this study was to examine the semantic load of grammatical gender and its relation with noun animacy, along with its neural correlates. In order to do this, a gender congruency effect was evaluated in a task in which participants were presented with pairs of primes-targets. A Spanish target pronoun (“esta” or “este”) was preceded by a gender congruent (estaF mesaF) or incongruent noun (este mesaF). Nouns belonged to one of the three different types of stimuli of the animacy hierarchy: animate nouns with biological gender (actriz - actress), animate nouns with grammatical gender (jirafa - giraffe), and inanimate nouns with grammatical gender (puerta - door). Participants were asked to determine the gender of the target personal pronoun (masculine/feminine). Results of the study revealed higher reaction times to target pronouns when preceded by gender incongruent than congruent primes. The effect was greater for nouns of biological gender in comparison to the other two categories. In addition, more positive wave lengths were observed in the incongruent primes in the occipito-parietal area. These results support the idea that the semantic load of gender is greater for nouns with biological gender than nouns with grammatical gender regardless of animacy.