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Semantic, phonological, and mediated priming in reading and lexical decisions
1Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee 37240.
Summary
Semantic and rhyming word relations facilitate lexical decision and self-paced reading tasks. However, mediated relations can inhibit responses, especially when nonwords are present, suggesting post-lexical access processing.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Psycholinguistics
- Experimental Psychology
Background:
- Understanding how concepts are represented and accessed in the mind is crucial for cognitive science.
- Previous research has explored semantic priming, but the interplay with phonological and graphemic relationships requires further investigation.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the spread of semantic activation to phonologically and graphemically related concepts.
- To examine how different word relations (semantic, rhyming, mediated) affect lexical decision and self-paced reading tasks.
- To determine the influence of nonword stimuli on these cognitive processes.
Main Methods:
- Conducted four experiments using lexical decision and self-paced reading tasks.
- Presented word pairs with semantic, rhyming, or mediated relations.
- Varied the presence or absence of nonword stimuli in the test lists.
Main Results:
- Semantic and rhyming relations consistently facilitated both tasks, irrespective of nonword presence.
- The effect of mediated relations was contingent on the presence of nonwords.
- Nonwords inhibited responses for mediated relations, suggesting post-lexical access interference.
Conclusions:
- Semantic and phonological/graphemic similarities influence word processing.
- The presence of nonwords can modulate cognitive processes, leading to inhibitory effects in mediated priming.
- Self-paced reading may offer advantages in distinguishing between lexical access and post-access processes.