Lexical inhibition and sublexical facilitation are surprisingly long lasting.

When a listener hears a word (beef), current theories of spoken word recognition posit the activation of both lexical (beef) and sublexical (/b/, /i/, /f/) representations. No lexical representation can be settled on for an unfamiliar utterance (peef). The authors examined the perception of nonwords (peef) as a function of words or nonwords heard 10-20 min earlier. In lexical decision, nonword recognition responses were delayed if a similar word had been heard earlier. In contrast, nonword processing was facilitated by the earlier presentation of a similar nonword (baff-paff). This pattern was observed for both word-initial (beef-peef), and word-final (job-jop) deviation. With the word-in-noise task, real word primes (beef) increased real word intrusions for the target nonword (peef), but only consonant-vowel (CV) or vowel-consonant (VC) intrusions were increased with similar pseudoword primes (baff-paff). The results across tasks and experiments support both a lexical neighborhood view of activation and sublexical representations based on chunks larger than individual phonemes (CV or VC sequences). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Priming and attentional control of lexical and sublexical pathways during naming.

A modified priming task was used to investigate whether skilled readers are able to adjust the degree to which lexical and sublexical information contribute to naming. On each trial, participants named 5 low-frequency exception word primes or 5 nonword primes before a target. The low-frequency exception word primes should have produced a greater dependence on lexical information, whereas the nonword primes should have produced a greater dependence on sublexical information. Across 4 experiments, the effects of lexicality, regularity, frequency, and imageability were all modulated in predictable ways on the basis of the notion that the primes directed attention to specific processing pathways. It is argued that these results are consistent with an attentional control hypothesis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Priming and attentional control of lexical and sublexical pathways in naming: A reevaluation.

The authors report 3 naming experiments using J. D. Zevin and D. A. Balota's (2000) multiple prime manipulation. They used 2 sets of nonword primes (fast and slow) and low-frequency exception word primes to separate the effects of prime speed from those of prime type. The size of the regularity effect was unaffected by prime type. Relative to the low-frequency exception word prime condition, the frequency effect was reduced in the fast, but not in the slow, nonword prime condition. Lexicality effect size was reduced in both nonword prime conditions, a result consistent with the lexical checking strategy described by S. J. Lupker, P. Brown, and L. Colombo (1997). The authors suggest that these results are better explained in terms of S. J. Lupker et al.'s time-criterion account than J. D. Zevin and D. A. Balota's pathway control hypothesis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Orthographic error monitoring in old age: Lexical and sublexical availability during perception and production.

Previous research suggests that older adults suffer declines in producing accurate spellings but retain the ability to accurately detect misspellings. The preservation of perception in the face of impaired production has been used to support a model of aging in which age impairs access to linguistic representations under specific circumstances, while representations themselves remain intact. The current research tests two predictions of this Transmission Deficit Hypothesis (TDH): first, that the differential effect of age on perception and production occurs when tasks are equated on response requirements and underlying representations, and second, that both word and spelling frequency interact to determine the effect of age on performance. Results of two error monitoring tasks supported the predictions of the TDH, demonstrating age-related production impairments that interacted with both word and spelling frequency, but no impairment of older adults' spelling perception, even for low frequency words or spellings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Word identification in reading proceeds from spelling to sound to meaning.

Van Orden (1987) reported that false positive errors in a categorization task are elevated for homophonic foils (e.g., {hare} for {a part of the human body}). Two new experiments replicate this finding and extend it to nonword homophone foils (e.g., {sute} for {an article of clothing}). False positive errors to nonword homophone foils substantially exceed false positive errors to nonhomophonic nonword spelling controls, showing that the phonological characteristics of the nonword foils are critical. Because nonwords are not represented in the lexicon, this new result implicates computed phonological codes as a source of the categorization errors. Additionally, in each of two experiments, matched word and nonword homophones produced virtually identical error rates. If stimulus nonword homophones are viewed as extremely unfamiliar words, compared with the relatively familiar stimulus word homophones, then our failure to observe an effect of stimulus familiarity strengthens the case that phonological coding plays a role in the identification of all printed words. The fact that the results are obtained in a categorization task that requires reading for meaning (rather than a lexical decision task) makes it difficult to avoid the conclusion that phonological mediation plays a role in normal reading of text for meaning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

From reading to spelling and spelling to reading: Transfer goes both ways.

This study compares the effects of practice spelling and reading specific words on the orthographic representations in memory involved in reading both practiced words and new, unfamiliar words. Typically developing readers in Grade 2 (mean age = 7 years, 7 months) participated in a training study examining whether transfer can occur between reading and spelling following a series of reading and spelling practice sessions. Practice consisted of either repeated reading or repeated spelling of words with shared orthographic rime patterns. A series of mixed analyses of variance was used to examine generalization within skill and transfer across skill. Following practice, word-specific transfer across skill was found. Specifically, children were better able to spell words they had practiced reading and to read words they had practiced spelling. In addition, generalization to new words with practiced rime units was found both within a skill and across skills. However, transfer from spelling to reading was greater than transfer from reading to spelling. Results indicate that the orthographic representations established through practice can be used for both reading and spelling. Subsequently, reading and spelling curricula should be coordinated to benefit children maximally. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

There's more to children's spelling than the errors they make: Strategic and automatic processes for one-syllable words.

Researchers have attempted to understand the cognitive processing used in spelling by looking at children's spelling errors. The authors examined 2 other types of data—children's self-reported verbal protocols and on-line measures of spelling latencies. Elementary school children spelled 3 types of common 4-letter words, consonant–consonant–vowel–consonant, consonant–vowel–consonant–consonant, and consonant–vowel–consonant–silent e. Correctly and incorrectly spelled words were analyzed as a function of word type, verbal report, and keystroke latencies. Different typing patterns emerged for strategic and automatic reports and for different word types. Children seemed to use a relatively sequential read-out from long-term memory when directly retrieving a spelling, whereas they used a consonant pair strategy for final consonant clusters when sounding out words. Implications for spelling instruction are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Lexical familiarity and processing efficiency: Individual differences in naming, lexical decision, and semantic categorization.

College students were separated into 2 groups (high and low) on the basis of 3 measures: subjective familiarity ratings of words, self-reported language experiences, and a test of vocabulary knowledge. Three experiments were conducted to determine if the groups also differed in visual word naming, lexical decision, and semantic categorization. High Ss were consistently faster than low Ss in naming visually presented words. They were also faster and more accurate in making difficult lexical decisions and in rejecting homophone foils in semantic categorization. Taken together, the results demonstrate that Ss who differ in lexical familiarity also differ in processing efficiency. The relationship between processing efficiency and working memory accounts of individual differences in language processing is also discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Frequency and neighborhood effects on lexical access: Lexical similarity or orthographic redundancy?

Five experiments investigated the effects of word frequency, neighborhood size, and bigram frequency on lexical decision and word-naming performance. Large neighborhood size, manipulated independently of bigram frequency, facilitated lexical decision and standard naming latencies for low-frequency words but had no effect on delayed naming performance. Bigram frequency, manipulated independently of neighborhood size, had no effect on lexical decision or naming performance. The data suggest that effects of neighborhood size reflect lexical similarity rather than orthographic redundancy and that they are due to lexical access rather than processes specific to lexical decision or naming tasks. The results are incompatible with models assuming that lexical access involves a serial comparison process. The implications for parallel models assuming localized and distributed representations are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonetic coherence in duplex perception: Effects of acoustic differences and lexical status.

A modified version of duplex perception was used to investigate the nature of perceptual organization of speech. Ss were asked to identify stimuli in which a 3rd-formant transition was presented to one ear and a full syllable (base) was presented to the other ear. Phonetic integration occurred even when the spectral composition or onset frequency of the isolated transition was varied relative to the base. However, when onset asynchronies were added to spectral differences, the isolated transition ceased to contribute to the syllable percept. Lexical status of the eventual phonetic percepts also influenced the phonetic integration of acoustic components into syllable percepts. These results suggest that combinations of low-level acoustic and phonetic differences between components and higher level lexical information interact to influence the grouping of acoustic components into phonetic percepts. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of speaking rate and lexical status on phonetic perception.

Among the contextual factors known to play a role in segmental perception are the rate at which the speech was produced and the lexical status of the item, that is, whether it is a meaningful word of the language. In a series of experiments on the word-initial /b/p/ voicing distinction, we investigated the conditions under which these factors operate during speech processing. The results indicated that under instructions of speeded responding, listeners could, on some trials, ignore some later occurring contextual information within the word that specified rate and lexical status. Importantly, however, they could not ignore speaking rate entirely. Although they could base their decision on only the early portion of the word, when doing so they treated the word as if it were physically short—that is to say, as if there were no later occurring information specifying a slower rate. This suggests that listeners always take account of rate when identifying the voicing value of a consonant, but precisely which information within the word is used to specify rate can vary with task demands. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of polysemy in lexical decision and naming: An alternative to lexical access accounts.

The effects of polysemy (number of meanings) and word frequency were examined in lexical decision and naming tasks. Polysemy effects were observed in both tasks. In the lexical decision task, high- and low-frequency words produced identical polysemy effects. In the naming task, however, polysemy interacted with frequency, with polysemy effects being limited to low-frequency words. When degraded stimuli were used in both tasks, the interaction appeared not only in naming but also in lexical decision. Because stimulus degradation also produced an effect of spelling-sound regularity in the lexical decision task, the different relationships between polysemy and frequency appear to be due to whether responding was based primarily on orthographic or phonological codes. As such, the effects of polysemy seem to be due to the nature of task-specific processes. An explanation in terms of M. S. Seidenberg and J. L. McClelland's (see record 1990-03520-001) and D. C. Plaut and J. L. McClelland's (1993) parallel distributed processing models is proposed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Contribution of spelling instruction to the spelling, writing, and reading of poor spellers.

The contribution of supplemental spelling instruction to spelling, writing, and reading was examined. Second-grade children experiencing difficulties learning to spell participated in 48 20-min sessions designed to improve their spelling skills. In comparison with peers in a contact control condition receiving mathematics instruction, students in the spelling condition made greater improvements on norm-referenced spelling measures, a writing-fluency test, and a reading word-attack measure following instruction. Six months later, students in the spelling treatment maintained their advantage in spelling but not on the writing-fluency and reading word-attack measures. However, spelling instruction had a positive effect at maintenance on the reading word-recognition skills of children who scored lowest on this measure at pretest. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Lexical, sublexical, and implicit memory processes in healthy young and healthy older adults and in individuals with dementia of the Alzheimer type.

Five groups of participants—healthy young, healthy young-old, healthy old-old, very mildly demented, and mildly demented individuals of the Alzheimer type (DAT)—participated in a 2-phase experiment that entailed a rhyme judgment task followed by a lexical decision task, in which half of the stimuli were earlier presented in the rhyme judgment task. The results of the rhyme task indicated that healthy young and older adults did not produce an influence of word frequency on rhyme decisions. However, the 2 groups of DAT individuals produced large word-frequency effects primarily for the nonrhyming pairs. The results of the lexical decision task indicated that (a) repetition facilitated lexical decisions to words, whereas there was evidence of inhibition for nonwords; and (b) there was an increasing influence of word frequency across the 5 groups of participants. The results are interpreted with respect to attentional control of appropriate (lexical and sublexical) processing pathways and the nature of processes that are disrupted and those that remain uninfluenced in healthy aging and DAT. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reaction time measures of spelling: Testing a two-strategy model of skilled spelling.

Two strategies have been suggested to be important in skilled English spelling: a lexical strategy, which relies on word-specific graphemic information, and a rule strategy, which relies on phoneme-to-grapheme correspondences. Limitations in the usefulness of spelling accuracy as a dependent variable make it difficult to test claims about how the strategies might work together. Two experimental paradigms that measure both spelling accuracy and time are suggested to be useful. Results produced with the paradigms were consistent with the claims that skilled spellers make use of both strategies and that the lexical strategy is more useful than the rule strategy. Working memory may be important in combining products of both strategies. Results were inconsistent with the claim that the rule strategy is invoked only when the lexical strategy fails to produce a complete spelling. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Can children and adults focus on sound as opposed to spelling in a phoneme counting task?

Given the well-established link between phonemic awareness and literacy, it is important to better understand the foundations of phonemic awareness. The authors investigated the phoneme counting task, examining the degree to which children reading at a first-grade level and college students can focus on sound as opposed to spelling. In 2 experiments, both groups were found to be sensitive to some phonetic details that are not systematically represented in print. They had some ability to distinguish between monophthongs (as in he) and diphthongs (as in how), and they tended to count fewer "sounds" for syllables ending with the more sonorous (or vowel-like) consonant /r/ than for syllables ending with less sonorous consonants. However, print-related knowledge also affected both groups. Even children judged syllables that were the names of letters to contain fewer "sounds" than syllables that were not letter names. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Context and lexical access: Implications of nonword interference for lexical ambiguity resolution.

To eliminate potential "backward" priming effects, S. Glucksberg et al (see record 1986-29080-001) introduced a variant of the cross-modal lexical priming task in which subjects made lexical decisions to nonword targets that were modeled on a word related to either the contextually biased or unbiased sense of an ambiguous word. Lexical decisions to nonwords were longer than controls only when the nonword was related to the contextually biased sense of the ambiguous word, leading Glucksberg et al to conclude that context does constrain lexical access and that the multiple access pattern observed in previous studies was probably an artifact of backward priming. We did not find nonword interference when the nonword targets used by Glucksberg et al were preceded by semantically related ambiguous or unambiguous word primes. However, we did replicate their sentence context results when the ambiguous words were removed from the sentences. We conclude that the interference obtained by Glucksberg et al is due to postlexical judgments of the congruence of the sentence context and the target, not to context constraining lexical access. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Frequency effects in lexical tasks: Reply to Balota and Chumbley.

In replying to D. A. Balota and J. I. Chumbley's (see record 1990-24407-001) commentary on the article by S. Monsell et al (see record 1989-24836-001), the author addresses four issues. New data show that the effect of frequency on semantic categorization time reported by Monsell et al. was not a disguised typicality effect. An account of the small size of the effect of stress pattern on immediate naming latency observed by Monsell et al. is supplied. Inferences that may and may not be drawn from effects of frequency on delayed naming latency are discussed. The main conclusions and methodological recommendations of Monsell et al. are clarified. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Written spelling to dictation: Sound-to-spelling regularity affects both writing latencies and durations.

The authors examined the effect of sound-to-spelling regularity on written spelling latencies and writing durations in a dictation task in which participants had to write each target word 3 times in succession. The authors found that irregular words (i.e., those containing low-probability phoneme-to-grapheme mappings) were slower both to initially produce and to execute in writing than were regular words. The regularity effect was found both when participants could and could not see their writing (Experiments 1 and 2) and was larger for low- than for high-frequency words (Experiment 3). These results suggest that central processing of the conflict generated by lexically specific and assembled spelling information for irregular words is not entirely resolved when the more peripheral processes controlling handwriting begin. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)