Evidence for sequential processing in visual word recognition.

The orthographic uniqueness point (OUP) of a word is introduced as the position of the 1st letter, reading from left to right, that distinguishes a word from all other printed words. In 3 experiments, observers named words that had early versus late OUPs. With unlimited viewing time, early-OUP words were named faster than late-OUP words. The effect disappeared in a delayed-naming task; hence, it was not associated with response production. The effect remained when exposure duration was reduced to limit eye movements. Results indicate that observers process the letters of a word in left-to-right order, contrary to strictly parallel accounts of word identification. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A dual read-out model of word context effects in letter perception: Further investigations of the word superiority effect.

A dual read-out model of context effects in letter perception is described that predicts forced-choice accuracy in the Reicher paradigm and its relation to word reportability. It is hypothesized that a correct choice to a letter in a word context is made when either the correct letter representation or a word representation containing the correct letter in the correct position reaches a response threshold (a criterion level of activation). This hypothesis was implemented using the basic architecture of the interactive activation model (J. L. McClelland & D. E. Rumelhart, 1981) in its semistochastic variant (A. M. Jacobs & J. Grainger, 1992). The model successfully captures the data of J. C. Johnston (1978), otherwise thought to be critically damaging for this type of model, and accurately predicts performance in a series of new experiments using the Reicher paradigm. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is there a neighborhood frequency effect in English? Evidence from reading and lexical decision.

What is the effect of a word's higher frequency neighbors on its identification time? According to activation-based models of word identification (J. Grainger & A. M. Jacobs, 1996; J. L. McClelland & D. E. Rumelhart, 1981), words with higher frequency neighbors will be processed more slowly than words without higher frequency neighbors because of the lexical competition mechanism embodied in these models. Although a critical prediction of these models, this inhibitory neighborhood frequency effect has been elusive in studies that have used English stimuli. In the present experiments, the effect of higher frequency neighbors was examined in the lexical decision task and when participants were reading sentences while their eye movements were monitored. Results suggest that higher frequency neighbors have little, if any, effect on the identification of English words. The implications for activation-based models of word identification are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reading speed in pure alexia

This study investigated possible causes of differences in reading speed between two alexic patients who read words letter by letter. As both patients appeared to rely on serial left-to-right processing of letters within words, the difference in reading speed did not seem to be related to any differences in the extent to which the patients could recognize letters in words in parallel or 'ends-in'. Differences in reading speed also seemed to be unrelated to the patients ability to identify individual letters since their letter recognition accuracy was very similar. Furthermore, although patient PD was significantly slower at reading words aloud than patient DC, PD was in fact significantly quicker than DC on a test that has previously been used to assess letter recognition skills in letter-by-letter readers. It is therefore concluded that PD reads words more slowly because of an additional impairment at the level of the word form system. The results therefore reinforce the distinction between Type 1 and Type 2 letter-by-letter readers that was first drawn by Patterson and Kay.     

Effect of meaning on letter detection.

Six experiments examined whether familiarity of word meaning affected letter detection in common function words. Fewer detection errors occurred for the when it had an unusual meaning, was contrastive, or had an ambiguous referent. Fewer errors occurred for less common meanings of in and it even when it took on less semantic content and was a function word. These experiments suggest that the length of time spent processing a given word is a major determinant of letter detection errors on that word, that common meanings of words are more quickly accessed than uncommon meanings, that word meaning plays an important role in letter detection, and that visual processing of letters occurs during a late stage of semantic accessing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Neighborhood size and neighborhood frequency effects in word recognition.

What are the effects of a word's orthographic neighborhood on the word recognition process? S. Andrews (1989) reported that large neighborhoods facilitate lexical access (the neighborhood size effect). J. Grainger, J. K. O'Regan, A. M. Jacobs, & J. Segui (1989) reported that higher frequency neighbors inhibit lexical access (the "neighborhood frequency effect"). Because neighborhood size and neighborhood frequency typically covary (words with large neighborhoods will usually possess higher frequency neighbors), these findings would seem to contradict one another. In the present study, 6 experiments on the effects of neighborhood size and neighborhood frequency indicated that, at least for low-frequency words, large neighborhoods do facilitate processing. However, the existence of higher frequency neighbors seems to facilitate rather than inhibit processing. The implications of these findings for serial and parallel models of lexical access are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is the orthographic/phonological onset a single unit in reading aloud?

Two main theories of visual word recognition have been developed regarding the way orthographic units in printed words map onto phonological units in spoken words. One theory suggests that a string of single letters or letter clusters corresponds to a string of phonemes (Coltheart, 1978; Venezky, 1970), while the other suggests that a string of single letters or letter clusters corresponds to coarser phonological units, for example, onsets and rimes (Treiman & Chafetz, 1987). These theoretical assumptions were critical for the development of coding schemes in prominent computational models of word recognition and reading aloud. In a reading-aloud study, we tested whether the human reading system represents the orthographic/phonological onset of printed words and nonwords as single units or as separate letters/phonemes. Our results, which favored a letter and not an onset-coding scheme, were successfully simulated by the dual-route cascaded (DRC) model (Coltheart, Rastle, Perry, Langdon, & Ziegler, 2001). A separate experiment was carried out to further adjudicate between 2 versions of the DRC model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do irregular letter combinations attract readers' attention? Evidence from fixation locations in words.

J. Hy?n?, P. Niemi, and G. Underwood (1989) provided evidence suggesting that in reading, the initial fixation lands farther into a word that has an informative as opposed to a redundant ending. The finding points to the potential importance of the within-word information distribution in determining fixation locations in words. However, the reliability of the effect has been recently challenged by K. Rayner and R. Morris (1992). The current study did not find much support for the notion that the relative informativeness of word endings would be a relevant factor in eye guidance. On the other hand, it did show that a highly irregular letter cluster in the beginning of a word attracts a fixation closer toward the word beginning, particularly to the space prior to the word. This finding is discussed in light of visual guidance models that emphasize the relevance of word length and spacing information for governing the eyes through a text. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dynamics of the attentional control of word retrieval: Analyses of response time distributions.

Since W. Wundt (1904) and H. J. Watt (1906), researchers have found no agreement on how goals direct word retrieval. A prevailing associative account (E. K. Miller & J. D. Cohen, 2001) holds that goals bias association strength, which determines retrieval latency and whether irrelevant words interfere. A symbolic account (A. Roelofs, 2003) holds that goals enable retrieval rules and predicts no strict dependence of interference on latency. Here, 3 chronometric experiments in which the role of relative retrieval latency was investigated through distributional analyses, following Watt, are reported. Participants verbally categorized picture-word pairs that were semantically related or unrelated, or they categorized single pictures or words. The pairs yielded semantic latency effects in both word and picture categorizing, although single words were categorized slower than single pictures. Semantic effects occurred in word categorizing even when postexposure of the pictures compensated for the difference in categorizing latency. Vincentile and ex-Gaussian analyses revealed that the semantic effects occurred throughout the latency distributions, excluding goal neglect as the cause of the effects. The results were interpreted as most consistent with the symbolic account, which was corroborated by computer simulations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Canadian studies of visual information-processing: 1970–1980.

Reviews Canadian research on reading and word identification and examines W. Herons's (see record 1959-00387-001) scanning theory that accounts for visual hemifield differences in terms of a serial left-to-right attentional mechanism operating on the stimulus trace. Heron's model, and subsequent work by M. P. Bryden (see record 1967-06490-001), introduced an information-processing approach to the study of perception in Canada and raised questions about the nature of attention, visual persistence, and letter and word recognition. These topics have continued to be a focus for research during the past decade. It is concluded that current results suggest at least 3 attentional processes, 3 buffer stores, and the use of extensive orthographic knowledge in processing letters and words. (French abstract) (2? p ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Evidence for a parallel input serial analysis model of word processing.

A parallel input serial analysis (PISA) model of word processing was developed and tested. The goal was to expand on the "critical processing duration" hypothesis of N. F. Johnson et al (1989) so that both single-word and multiple-word presentation, letter detection data could be explained. In Experiments 1–3 four different word frequency categories on a single-presentation, letter detection task were used. These three experiments indicated that there was a curvilinear relationship between word frequency and letter detection reaction time (RT). That is, letter detection RTs for medium-high-frequency words were significantly longer than letter detection RTs for very-high-, low-, and very-low-frequency words. These results support the PISA model rather than the A. F. Healy et al (see record 1987-23957-001) version of the unitization model. In Experiments 4–5 multiple-presentation (i.e., two words), letter detection tasks were used. The PISA model could also account for the results from these two experiments, but the unitization model could not. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Direct Assessments of the Processing Time Hypothesis for the Missing-Letter Effect.

When participants search for a target letter while reading, they make more omissions if the target letter is embedded in frequently used words or in the most frequent meaning of a polysemic word. According to the processing time hypothesis, this occurs because familiar words and meanings are identified faster, leaving less time for letter identification. Contrary to the predictions of the processing time hypothesis, with a rapid serial visual presentation procedure, participants were slower at detecting target letters for more frequent words or the most frequent meaning of a word (Experiments 1 and 2) or at detecting the word itself instead of a target letter (Experiment 3). In Experiments 4 and 5, participants self-initiated the presentation of each word, and the same pattern of results was observed as in Experiments 1 and 3. Positive correlations were also found between omission rate and response latencies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Neighbourhood density effects in reading aloud: New insights from simulations with the DRC model.

A series of nine simulations with the Dual Route Cascaded (DRC) model (M. Coltheart, K. Rastle, C. Perry, R. Langdon, & J. Ziegler, 2001) investigated neighbourhood density (N) effects in nonword and word naming. Two main findings emerged from this work. First, when naming nonwords there are two loci for the effect of N in the model, contrary to M. Coltheart et al.'s single locus explanation of what the model is doing. The early N effect involves interactive activation between the orthographic lexicon and the letter units such that high N facilitates letter identification, which in turn affects the nonlexical route. The late N effect arises from activation in the orthographic lexicon that feeds forward to the phonological lexicon and primes phonemes in the phoneme system. Second, when naming words the presence/absence of an effect of N on the Letter Units through feedback from the lexical level depends on the parameter settings. Implications and suggestions for future directions are made. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Semantic processing of previews within compound words.

Previous studies have suggested that previews of words prior to fixation can be processed orthographically, but not semantically, during reading of sentences (K. Rayner, D. A. Balota, & A. Pollatsek, 1986). The present study tested whether semantic processing of previews can occur within words. The preview of the second constituent of 2-constituent Finnish compound nouns was manipulated. The previews were either identical to the 2nd constituent or they were incorrect in the form of a semantically related word, a semantically unrelated word, or a semantically meaningless nonword. The results indicate that previews of 2nd constituents within compound words can be semantically processed. The results have important implications for understanding the nature of preview and compound word processing. These issues are crucial to developing comprehensive models of eye-movement control and word recognition during reading. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

German Capitalization of Nouns and the Detection of Letters in Continuous Text.

The missing-letter effect refers to the phenomenon that letters are more difficult to detect in common function words (such as the) than in content words. Assuming that the missing-letter effect is diagnostic of the extraction of text structure, we exploited a special feature of German - the convention to capitalize the initial letter of nouns. Given the great flexibility of word order in German, it was proposed that this convention might help readers specify the structure of the sentence. Therefore orthographic variations that violate the capitalization rules should disrupt structure extraction and should result in a reduced missing-letter effect. The results indicated that: 1) capitalization of function words eliminated the missing-letter effect, but not at the beginning of a sentence; 2) A missing-letter effect occurred when the capitalization of the first letter was correct, but was followed by type-case alternation, and also when the size of the initial letters was relatively large for function words, but relatively small for content words. The results were discussed with respect to the possible contributions of visual familiarity, structural role, and processing time to the missing-letter effect, taking into account that a capitalized initial letter conveys significant information about the word class for German readers. Thus, the present results indicate that readers take advantage not only of function words but of any other information (here the capitalization of nouns) that helps to extract the structure of a sentence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Wrestling with ambiguity—further reflections: Reply to Masson and Borowsky (1995) and Rueckl (1995).

As noted by S. Joordens and D. Besner (see record 1995-07873-001), a number of distributed models of word recognition encounter difficulties when processing words that have multiple meanings because of competition that occurs when the multiple meanings attempt to instantiate their patterns of activation across a semantic level of representation. This contrasts with humans' lack of difficulty in naming and lexical decision when processing ambiguous words in the absence of a manipulated context. Joordens and Besner therefore concluded that the processing of ambiguous words represents an interesting challenge for distributed models of word recognition. A number of critical issues highlighted in the commentaries by M. E. J. Masson and R. Borowsky (see record 1995-31413-001) and by J. G. Rueckl (see record 1995-31416-001) are addressed in the present article. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

What Do Letter Migration Errors Reveal About Letter Position Coding in Visual Word Recognition?

Dividing attention across multiple words occasionally results in misidentifications whereby letters apparently migrate between words. Previous studies have found that letter migrations preserve within-word letter position, which has been interpreted as support for position-specific letter coding. To investigate this issue, the authors used word pairs like STEP and SOAP, in which a letter in 1 word could migrate to an adjacent letter in another word to form an illusory word (STOP). Three experiments show that both same-position and adjacent-position letter migrations can occur, as well as migrations that cross 2 letter positions. These results argue against position-specific letter coding schemes used in many computational models of reading, and they provide support for coding schemes based on relative rather than absolute letter position. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A multinomial model for short-term priming in word identification.

A simple multinomial model for short-term priming in perceptual word identification is presented. In the experiments to which the model is applied, prime words are presented just prior to a flashed target word, and subjects must decide which of 2 alternative words matches the target. The model assumes that on some proportion of trials, confusion among the words leads to the decision being based on 1 of the prime words instead of the target. In addition, it is assumed that subjects sometimes discount a prime that matches 1 of the test alternatives and so choose the alternative that does not match. With these assumptions, the model fits the data from 5 experiments (including 4 used to develop the model known as ROUSE [responding optimally with unknown sources of evidence]; D. E. Huber, R. Shiffrin, K. Lyle, & K. Ruys, 2001). The multinomial model fits the data about as well as the ROUSE model and so should lead to further development and critical testing of both models. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Theories of word naming interact with spelling--sound consistency.

In a previous study (E. Strain, K. Patterson, & M. S. Seidenberg, 1995), the authors concluded that word naming is characterized by an interaction between spelling-sound typicality and word imageability, thus implicating a role for word meaning in the naming process. J. Monaghan and A. W. Ellis (2002) reject E. Strain et al.'s conclusion, arguing that it is age of acquisition (AoA) and not imageability that interacts with spelling-sound typicality. In this article, the authors question their alternative interpretation (a) by raising a number of conceptual and methodological issues germane to this debate and (b) by presenting new data that confirm a significant interaction between spelling-sound typicality and imageability in word-naming latencies, an interaction that is reliable when word AoA is controlled in a regression analysis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)