Phonological recoding and reading.

Examines contradictory research that attempted to determine whether the process of lexical access in silent reading is mediated by an internal phonological representation or only by visual representations. More recent evidence is discussed that suggests that factors such as difficulty of material, frequency of occurrence of items, Ss' fluency, and task demands—which are seldom manipulated in typical studies of word recognition—play important roles in determining the type of mediation used. It is noted that interest has shifted to a family of dual access models in which both phonological mediation and visual mediation are ordinarily used in parallel. Thus, data point to a dual access model in which high-frequency words enjoy high-speed access via a visually based representation, whereas low-frequency words are accessed using a slower, phonological recoding process. (113 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonological recoding in reading for meaning by adults and children.

Phonological recoding in reading has been studied by requiring adults or children to judge whether printed sentences are correct or not. When some sentences are orthographically unacceptable but phonologically acceptable (e.g., The girl through the ball), both children and adults make abnormally many false positives with such sentences. It is unclear whether the phonological recoding that produces this effect is attributable to assembled (nonlexical) or addressed (lexical) phonology. Two types of phonologically acceptable but orthographically unacceptable sentences were devised: Those in which the crucial item ("through" in the above example) was an irregular word (so that its phonology could only be obtained lexically), and those in which the crucial item was a homophonic nonword (so that its phonology could only be obtained by assembled phonology). Both types of sentence produced significantly high false-positive rates for adult readers and children, indicating the use of assembled and addressed phonology during sentence reading. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A comment on Tolman's "Metatheoretical constructivism."

Clarifies and corrects misunderstandings of J. R. Royce's (see record 1980-20063-001) article on theory construction in psychology as interpreted by C. Tolman (1980) in his critique of metatheoretical constructivism. Epistemological points to be refuted in Tolman's article are also presented. (French abstract) (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A comment on Sampson's "Psychology and the American ideal."

E. E. Sampson's (see record 1979-28675-001) thesis concerning self-contained individualism is examined from a dialectical perspective. It is suggested that his analysis is incomplete because he does not consider the possibility that symbiosis–dependence may be masked by apparent interdependence or individualism. Moreover, his critical discussion of androgyny appears to be a one-sided interpretation that ignores the probability that interdependence may follow from independence, rather than the reverse. (4 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonological recoding of nonword orthographic rime primes.

The effectiveness of nonword orthographic rime primes as a function of the regularity (as defined by grapheme-phoneme correspondence [GPC] rules) of typical pronunciation was examined in this research. In Experiments 1 and 2, predictions from GPC and orthographic rime unit accounts converged, but in Experiments 3 and 4 they diverged. Experiment 1 showed that when nonword orthographic rimes were used to prime consistent regular words (e.g., mist) and atypically irregular words (e.g., pint), reliable priming was observed for regular words, but priming of atypically irregular words occurred only in the 2nd block of trials, after the orthographic rime prime itself had been primed by the Block 1 presentation of the target word. In subsequent experiments, only the 1st block of trials was examined. Experiment 2 replicated selective priming of consistent regular words observed in Block 1 of Experiment 1. In Experiment 3, nonword orthographic rimes were as effective at priming typically irregular target words (e.g., grind) as they were in priming inconsistent but typically regular target words (e.g., flint)… (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The "equal-risk" model: A comment on McNemar.

Comments on Q. McNemar's (see record 1975-30837-001) suggested procedure for eliminating unfairness in personnel selection with respect to population subgroups and considers legal questions regarding civil rights and Equal Employment Opportunity considerations. McNemar misunderstood the purpose of the procedure advocated by H. J. Einhorn and A. R. Bass's (1971) equal risk model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to "A comment on alcoholism, alpha production, and biofeedback."

Replies to A. G. Glaros's (see record 1978-08480-001) critical comments concerning the research of F. W. Jones and D. S. Holmes (1976) in which it was found that alpha biofeedback training was ineffective with alcoholics. It is concluded that the criticisms do not necessitate a rejection of the data but instead highlight the questionable incremental validity of biofeedback training in clinical settings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Onion or orrisroot: A comment on Bevan's "Tour inside the onion."

E. S. Wood comments that W. Bevan's (see record 1991-28688-001) complaints about the triviality of many contemporary psychology papers and the science-by-the-numbers attitudes of psychology scholars form an eloquent prophesy. Continuing Bevan's metaphor of psychology as an onion, Wood suggests that psychology's innermost layer is an orrisroot. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ecological memory reconsidered: A comment on Bruce's "The how and why of ecological memory."

The present authors explore the exact role of the ecology of the acts of memorizing and remembering in D. Bruce's (see record 1986-03043-001) program of research. It is argued that although there is much to praise in Bruce, his program does not tackle the difficult problem of guiding the research in assessing and identifying ecologically valid problems of memory. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Completed suicide in the gifted: A late comment on "Suicide among gifted women."

A recent study by C. Tomlinson-Keasey et al (see record 1986-24809-001) found differences between completed suicides in L. M. Terman's sample of gifted children and comparison Ss. The present article suggests that the differences identified in Tomlinson-Keasey et al may have been confounded by the fact that completed suicides are typically found to have higher levels of psychiatric disturbance than nonsuicides. Data are presented to illustrate that when the completed suicides in Terman's sample are matched for psychiatric disturbance with the comparison Ss, few differences are found. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonological recoding and orthographic learning: A direct test of the self-teaching hypothesis

According to the self-teaching hypothesis (Share, 1995), word-specific orthographic representations are acquired primarily as a result of the self-teaching opportunities provided by the phonological recoding of novel letter strings. This hypothesis was tested by asking normal second graders to read aloud short texts containing embedded pseudoword targets. Three days later, target spellings were correctly identified more often, named more quickly, and spelled more accurately than alternate homophonic spellings. Experiment 2 examined whether this rapid orthographic learning can be attributed to mere visual exposure to target strings. It was found that viewing the target letter strings under conditions designed to minimize phonological processing significantly attenuated orthographic learning. Experiment 3 went on to show that this reduced orthographic learning was not attributable to alternative nonphonological factors (brief exposure durations or decontextualized presentation). The results of a fourth experiment suggested that the contribution of pure visual exposure to orthographic learning is marginal. It was concluded that phonological recoding is critical to the acquisition of word-specific orthographic representations as proposed by the self-teaching hypothesis.     

Defining the boundaries of "policy-relevant" research: A comment on Blight.

Questions J. G. Blight's (see record 1987-16803-001) advocacy of a crisis learning approach in seeking understanding of policymakers' behavior concerning nuclear war; it is suggested that the role of psychologists in the policy community needs definition and that the relevance of a psychological approach in this area could be established. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonological codes and eye movements in reading.

A number of recent studies using eye movement data have yielded evidence suggesting that phonological codes are activated early in an eye fixation. However, experiments reported by M. Daneman and E. Reingold (1993; M. Daneman, E. M. Reingold, & M. Davidson, 1995) yielded data that led them to argue that phonological codes are primarily activated after lexical access has occurred. In this study, 3 experiments were carried out that were conceptually similar to those of M. Daneman and E. Reingold, and the resulting data supported the position that phonological codes are activated very early in an eye fixation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal reflections on reading Sarason's "Community psychology, networks, and Mr. Everyman."

Responds to S. B. Sarason's (see record 1977-06620-001) discussion of the failure of people involved in institutional and community mental health administration to acknowledge social and political realities and to work effectively within the real world. Suggestions are included for observing real world dynamics before initiating changes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonological and semantic activation in reading kanji characters.

In a large proportion of the complex kanji characters resulting from the combination of two radicals, the left radical gives information about the meaning of the whole character, and the right one gives cues to pronunciation. In this study, this feature was exploited to investigate the relative contribution of semantic and phonological information in the process of recognizing a word written in kanji. In 2 experiments, a technique was used in which part of the target character (i.e.. the left radical, carrying the semantic information; the right, phonetic radical, or a fragment) was presented shortly (60 or 180 ms stimulus onset asynchrony [SOA]) before the exposure of the whole character, which had to be named as fast as possible. Earlier exposure of the phonetic radical produced facilitation of the naming response, which was stronger at the 180-ms SOA than at the 60-ms SOA, whereas preexposure of the semantic radical had a weak facilitatory effect at the 60-ms SOA and some inhibition at the 180-ms SOA. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Children's use of triadic eye gaze information for "mind reading."

Five experiments examined children's use of eye gaze information for "mind-reading" purposes, specifically, for inferring another person's desire. When presented with static displays in the first 3 experiments, only by 4 years of age did children use another person's eye direction to infer desires, although younger children could identify the person's focus of attention. Further, 3-year-olds were capable of inferring desire from other nonverbal cues, such as pointing (Experiment 3). When eye gaze was presented dynamically with several other scaffolding cues (Experiment 4), 2- and 3-year-olds successfully used eye gaze for desire inference. Scaffolding cues were removed in Experiment 5, and 2- and 3-year-olds still performed above chance in using eye gaze. Results suggest that 2-year-olds are capable of using eye gaze alone to infer about another's desire. The authors propose that the acquisition of the ability to use attentional cues to infer another's mental state may involve both an association process and a differentiation process. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Does marital agony precede marital ecstasy? A comment on Gottman and Krokoff's "Marital interaction and satisfaction: A longitudinal view."

In a recent article, J. M. Gottman and L. J. Krokoff (see record 1989-25730-001) presented a fascinating and counterintuitive portrayal of a temporally related dynamic relationship of marital conflict and marital satisfaction. Unfortunately the results from which their conclusions spring are quite problematic. In a 2-wave, extreme-groups design, Gottman and Krokoff used raw change in satisfaction as a correlate of Time 1 conflict variables for purposes of analysis. Serious psychometric questions arise with this approach to the causal assessment of change. Given the considerations raised, there is a high likelihood that Gottman and Krokoff's data result from statistical artifact. Alternative approaches to the measurement of change are discussed in the context of illustrating the problematic components of Gottman and Krokoff's analysis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Phonological awareness and early reading: A meta-analysis of experimental training studies.

In a quantitative meta-analysis, the effects of phonological awareness training on reading were shown. In a homogeneous set of U.S. studies with a randomized or matched design, the combined effect sizes for phonological awareness and reading were d?=?0.73 (r?=?.34, N?=?739) and d?=?0.70 (r?=?.33, N?=?745), respectively. Thus, experimentally manipulated phonological awareness explains about 12% of the variance in word-identification skills. The combined effect size for long-term studies of the influence of phonological awareness training on reading was much smaller, d?=?0.16 (r?=?.08, N?=?1,180). Programs combining a phonological and a letter training were more effective than a purely phonological training. Furthermore, training effects were stronger with posttests assessing simple decoding skills than with real-word-identification tests. In sum, phonological awareness is an important but not a sufficient condition for early reading. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"On being sane in insane places": A comment from England.

Comments on 3 aspects of D. L. Rosenhan's (see record 1973-21600-001) report on simulated schizophrenia. First, psychiatric diagnosis, particularly of schizophrenia, is culture bound rather than absolute and depends on the interaction between the symptoms presented by a patient (or pseudopatient) and the background and training of the psychiatrist. Diagnostic errors will decrease as criteria for schizophrenia become more clearly defined and universally accepted. Second, the ethics of research using pseudopatients is questioned. Widespread use of simulation may bring research itself into disrepute. Third, as psychiatric hospitals become more oriented toward the therapeutic community, continuous patient assessment and monitoring become possible through increased informal contact with the staff. Diagnostic errors are thus less likely to occur. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)