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The role of sublexical graphemic processing in reading
1Centre de Recherche de l'Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada. jouberts@ere.umontreal.ca
Brain and Language
|March 16, 2000
Summary
This study confirms a graphemic parsing stage in reading, occurring before grapheme-phoneme conversion. Normal readers showed slower processing of complex graphemes, supporting dual-route reading models.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Neuroscience
- Linguistics
Background:
- Dual-route models of reading propose separate lexical and sublexical processing pathways.
- Sublexical reading involves graphemic parsing, graphophonemic conversion, and phoneme blending.
- Previous research in reading pathology suggested functional independence of cognitive procedures.
Purpose of the Study:
- To provide evidence for a distinct graphemic parsing stage in reading.
- To investigate the processing order of graphemic parsing and grapheme-phoneme conversion.
- To support recent dual-route models of reading.
Main Methods:
- Normal adult subjects participated in the study.
- Participants read nonwords containing multiletter graphemes.
- Reading times for complex graphemes were compared to simple graphemes.
Main Results:
- Nonwords with multiletter graphemes were read significantly slower than those with simple graphemes.
- This indicates a processing delay associated with graphemic parsing.
- The findings align with the proposed stages of sublexical reading.
Conclusions:
- Evidence supports the existence of a graphemic parsing process preceding grapheme-phoneme conversion.
- The findings reinforce the validity of dual-route models of reading.
- The functional independence of graphemic parsing is supported by data from normal readers.
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