Lexical decision as an indirect test of memory: Repetition priming and list-wide priming as a function of type of encoding.

Two experiments examined priming in the lexical decision task, an indirect test of memory. Experiment 1 manipulated type of processing during study of unrelated word pairs. Recognition of individual words benefited more from semantic than from nonsemantic processing. Repetition priming in lexical decision depended on the context in which the target appeared. Targets preceded at test by unstudied primes showed greater repetition priming if processed nonsemantically during study; targets preceded at test by studied primes were not affected by type of processing at study. Interestingly, studied targets were facilitated more by studied than by unstudied primes regardless of whether the prime came from the same pair as the target. This list-wide episodic priming occurred under all four processing conditions in Experiment 1 (consonant counting, rote rehearsal, pleasantness rating, and sentence generation) with a 250-ms stimulus onset asynchrony. Experiment 2 showed that this list-wide episodic priming disappeared by 1,000 ms, suggesting that it had resulted from relatively transient activation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)