Musical semantics: Dimensions, processes, and neural correlates 125 regular chord function. (c) Left: Grand-average ERPs of in-key chords ( rst to fth postion), elicited by sequences such as the sequence shown in the left panel of (b). The amplitude of the N5 (indicated by the arrow) was dependent on the position of the chords in the cadence: The amplitude of the N5 decreases with increasing har-monic context build-up (modi ed from Koelsch et al., 2000). Right: A similar amp-litude-decline can be observed for the N400 elicited by semantically correct open class words during sentence comprehension (modi ed from Van Petten & Kutas, 1990). The amplitude-decline was inversely correlated with the word’s ordinal posi-tion in relatively simple English sentences, refecting the build up of constraints im-posed by a partial sentence upon individual succeeding words. (d) Grand-average EPRs elicited by the nal chords of sequences such as those shown in (b), separately for regular (dotted line) and irregular (solid line) chords. Compared to the ERPs of regular chords, irregular chords elicited ERAN and N5 potentials (modi ed from Koelsch et al., 2000).Figure 3: Examples of experimental stimuli used in the studies by Koelsch et al. (2005) and Steinbeis & Koelsch (2008b). Top: examples of two chord sequences in C major, ending on a regular (upper row) and an irregular chord (lower row, the ir -regular chord is indicated by the arrow). Bottom: examples of the three different sentence types, the critical word is the last word of each sentence. Onsets of chords (presented auditorily) and words (presented visually) were synchronous. Reprinted from Steinbeis & Koelsch (2008b).