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Looks aren't everything: pseudohomophones prime words but nonwords do not
1Department of Psychology, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA 95192-0120, USA. huntsman@email.sjsu.edu
Journal of Psycholinguistic Research
|January 16, 2007
Summary
This study shows that pseudohomophones, words that sound alike but are spelled differently, affect how quickly people recognize words. Phonological codes influence word recognition but are not sensitive to word frequency.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Psycholinguistics
- Lexical Access
Background:
- Previous research explored phonological and orthographic effects of pseudohomophones.
- This study introduces a novel approach with fewer pseudohomophones and extended prime-target lags.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the influence of phonological codes on lexical representation.
- To examine the role of pseudohomophones in word recognition tasks.
Main Methods:
- Utilized a lexical decision task with word, pseudohomophone, and nonword primes.
- Manipulated the lag between primes and targets (mean lag = 8).
- Equated pseudohomophones and nonword controls for orthography.
Main Results:
- Word and pseudohomophone primes facilitated lexical decision response latencies to word targets.
- Nonword primes did not influence response latencies to word targets.
- Pseudohomophones showed longer response latencies and higher error rates compared to orthographically matched nonwords, indicating pseudohomophone effects.
- Pseudohomophones did not exhibit a base word frequency effect, unlike base words.
Conclusions:
- Phonological codes significantly influence lexical representation.
- The influence of phonological codes on lexical representation is not sensitive to base word frequency.
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