Semantic interference in a randomized naming task: effects of age, order, and category

Area of Science:

• Psycholinguistics
• Cognitive Psychology
• Neuroscience

Background:

• Lexical retrieval is a competitive process where target words are selected from coactivated items.
• Semantic interference, where related items increase competition, is known from blocked and continuous naming tasks.
• These structured tasks may not reflect natural word retrieval.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate semantic interference in a more naturalistic, randomized picture naming task.
• To examine if older adults experience greater difficulty with lexical competition compared to younger adults.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective analysis of naming latencies from a randomized picture naming task.
• Inclusion of a large, diverse adult sample (ages 22-89).
• Examination of the interaction between semantic category and item presentation order.

Main Results:

• Semantic interference effects were observed: miscellaneous items were named faster, while related items were named slower.
• The magnitude of the semantic interference effect did not differ significantly across age groups.
• Contrary to the hypothesis, older adults did not show increased susceptibility to semantic interference.

Conclusions:

• Semantic interference occurs even in randomized naming tasks, suggesting it's a robust aspect of lexical retrieval.
• Age does not appear to modulate the susceptibility to semantic interference in word production.
• The findings challenge the notion that older adults are disproportionately affected by lexical competition.