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歧义是自然语言中一种普遍存在的语言现象。在中文词汇中，不仅包括词汇水平的歧义还包括语素水平的歧义。本文从歧义的角度出发分别考察不同水平的语义歧义如何影响中文词汇的加工与表征。
研究一考察了发生词汇水平的歧义词的加工与表征。我们采用眼动跟踪技术，通过三个眼动实验，考察了中文同形异义词和多义词是否有着相同的加工方式与表征。在研究中，要求中文读者阅读包含同形异义词（实验1），多义词（实验2）或者同时包含同形异义词和多义词（实验3）的实验句子。同时，操纵了目标词前语境的语义偏向（主要义项语境，次要义项语境或中性语境）和目标词后消歧信息的语义偏向（主要义项消歧或次要义项消歧）。当语境类型与消歧类型支持歧义词的同一个义项时，构成一致语义条件；反之，构成不一致语义条件。三个实验的实验结果一致地发现，与一致语义条件相比，在不一致语义条件下，读者对消歧区域的注视时间更长，回视概率更高。结果表明，同形异义词和多义词的多个义项均是以独立词条形式表征的。
研究二考察了发生在语素水平的歧义复合词的加工与表征。在实验4 和5 中，考察了在中文阅读中，首字歧义语素的中文视觉复合词在加工早期采取整词语义还是语素语义优先通达的加工方式。我们采用边界范式，操纵了复合词尾字语素的预视，使其可以偏向首字语素的主要义项（主要义项预视）或次要义项（次要义项预视）。实验4 的实验结果发现，与次要义项预视条件相比，读者在主要义项预视条件下在目标词上的注视时间更短。实验5 操纵了预视词与目标词的整词语义相似性后，发现当预视词与目标词之间存在高整词语义相关时，主要义项预视条件下的注视时间显著短于次要义项预视下的注视时间。但是，当预视词与目标词在整词水平是低语义相关时，这种预视的促进效应消失了。两个实验的结果表明，在中文阅读过程中，视觉复合词的整词语义会在早期被优先激活。在实验6 中，采用了词汇情境范式考察了孤立听觉复合词中的语素加工及其时间进程。
实验结果发现，与无关词相比，语素语义相关词和整词语义相关词显著地吸引了更多的注视。更重要的是，通过对时间进程的结果分析发现，语素竞争效应出现的时间点要早于整词竞争效应。表明，孤立听觉词汇识别中，语素语义会先于整词语义被激活。
本文通过一系列的实验研究发现，词汇水平的歧义词在加工过程中会受到语境和义项频率的影响，而义项之间的语义相关性不会影响歧义词表征的实质，同形异义词和多义词都是以独立词条的方式进行表征。此外，我们还发现，在阅读过程中，中文视觉复合词的语义通达主要通过整词通达通路实现，语素歧义对复合词的语义通达影响较小。而在孤立听觉复合词的识别过程中，首字语素语义先于整词语义被激活，表明不同加工通道中的复合词有着不同的加工机制。

Lexical ambiguity is a universal phenomenon in languages. For Chinese words,the lexical ambiguity occurs not only at the word level but also at the morphemic level. This paper aimed to investigate how different levels of semantic ambiguity influence the processing and representation of Chinese words.
In the first study, we explored the processing and representation of Chinese words with semantic ambiguity occurring at the word level. To be more specifically, in three separate experiments, we used eye-tracking technique to investigate whether senses of polysemous words and meanings of homonymous words are represented and processed similarly or differently in Chinese reading. Readers read sentences containing homonymous words (Experiment 1), polysemous words (Experiment 2), or both (Experiment 3). The contexts of text preceding the target words were manipulated to bias the participants toward reading the ambiguous words according to their dominant, subordinate, or neutral meanings. Similarly, disambiguating regions following the target words were also manipulated to favor either the dominant or subordinate meanings of ambiguous words. The results of these three experiments showed that there were similar eye movement patterns when Chinese participants read sentences containing homonymous and polysemous words. The study also found that participants took longer to read the target word and the disambiguating text following it when the prior context and disambiguating regions favored divergent meanings rather than the same meaning. These results suggested that homonymy and polysemy are represented similarly in the mental lexicon when a particular meaning (sense) is fully specified by disambiguating information. Furthermore, multiple meanings (senses) are represented in Chinese reading as separate entries in the mental lexicon.
In the second study, we explored the processing and representation of compound words with morphemic ambiguity. Specifically, in Experiment 4 and 5, we examined whether the morphological decomposition route or the direct whole-word access route is the primary processing route during processing of visual compound words. Using boundary paradigm, the preview of the second character was manipulated to bias either the dominant or the subordinate meaning of the first character. Results of Experiment 4 showed that the fixation durations in the subordinate condition was longer than those in the dominant condition. In Experiment 5, the semantic similarity occurring at the whole-word level between the preview words and target words was manipulated. Results showed that fixation durations in the dominant condition was shorter than those in the subordinate condition when the preview word was highly semantically related with the target words. However, this facilitation effect was absent when the preview words were lowly semantically related with the target words. These results showed that the whole-word meaning was activated earlier in the processing of compound word in reading. In Experiment 6, we employed a printed-word paradigm to investigate the processing of auditory compound words and found that both morphemic and wholeword competitors attracted more fixations than the distractor. More importantly, results of the time-course analysis showed that the morphemic meaning was activated earlier than that of the whole-word meaning, suggesting that the importance of morphological decomposition route in the recognition of isolated auditory compound word.
In summary, the processing of words with lexical ambiguity are affected by both contextual information and meaning frequency. The semantic relatedness among meanings (senses) do not influence the lexical representation of words. And both homonymous and polysemous words are represented as separate lexical entries in the mental lexicon. In addition, we also found that the whole-word meaning of compound words was activated earlier for visual compound words during reading. And the morphemic meaning of compound words was activated earlier than the whole-word meaning in the recognition of isolated auditory compound word. There results indicated that Chinese compounds in different modalities are processed via different processing routes.