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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jul 18, 2026

Comparing the Frequency Effect Between the Lexical Decision and Naming Tasks in Chinese

Comparing the Frequency Effect Between the Lexical Decision and Naming Tasks in Chinese

Published on: April 1, 2016

Familiarity effects and word unitization in visual comparison tasks.

Memory & Cognition

|July 1, 1989

Summary

Familiar words are identified faster than non-words, a familiarity effect that is more pronounced in simultaneous tasks. This suggests facilitated encoding due to activated cognitive units, not just perceptual unitization.

Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Experimental Psychology
Human Information Processing

Background:

The recognition of familiar stimuli is often faster than novel ones.
Previous research suggests a 'familiarity effect' in word recognition tasks.
Understanding the cognitive mechanisms underlying this effect is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the magnitude of the familiarity effect in different visual matching tasks.
To differentiate between perceptual unitization and facilitated encoding as explanations for the familiarity effect.
To explore the role of cognitive units in rapid word identification.

Main Methods:

Participants performed simultaneous and sequential visual matching tasks.
Tasks involved decisions about the identity of word and non-word stimuli.

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Reaction times and accuracy were measured to assess decision speed.

Main Results:

Decisions for identical words were faster than for identical non-words.
The familiarity effect was larger in the simultaneous matching task compared to the sequential task.
Word matching was slower than matching a single letter to a location within a word.

Conclusions:

The findings rule out a simple perceptual unitization account of the familiarity effect.
The familiarity effect is better explained by facilitated encoding via activated holistic cognitive units.
This highlights the role of memory and cognitive representations in efficient visual processing.