Analytic word recognition among L2 speakers: Evidence from character recognition among CSL speakers

This study explored analytic visual word recognition among speakers of Chinese as a second language (CSL). Two innovative methods were used: the priming paradigm and the false memory paradigm both involving Chinese characters with another character embedded in them (e.g., -, safe-woman) and character decomposition. Two important findings were obtained. In Experiment 1, CSL speakers were found to respond to a character faster if it was embedded in the prime character but Chinese native speakers showed no such priming effect. In Experiment 2 where a recognition task was used, CSL speakers responded positively to characters that were not displayed in the study phase but were embedded in a character displayed earlier and when they correctly rejected such a character, they took longer to do so compared to control items. Native Chinese speakers showed no such a false memory effect. These results corroborated well with the stroke number effect observed in previous studies and provided further and more direct evidence for the involvement of analytic word recognition among L2 speakers. They raised important questions for future research, as well.