Gender and lexical access in Italian

Area of Science:

• Psycholinguistics
• Cognitive Science
• Linguistics

Background:

• Lexical access models explore how words are recognized and retrieved from memory.
• Grammatical gender and phonological cues are known to influence language processing.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the effects of semantic and grammatical gender on lexical access in Italian.
• To examine the interaction of gender with other lexical access factors.
• To compare two new procedures for studying lexical access.

Main Methods:

• Two tasks were used: a gender-monitoring task (requiring conscious gender decisions) and a word repetition task (without explicit gender attention).
• Single words were presented out of context under speeded conditions.
• Reaction times were measured to assess word recognition and processing.

Main Results:

• Both tasks were sensitive to word recognition, with reaction times linked to the point of unique word identification.
• Phonological factors (length, syllables, initial consonant) strongly affected reaction times in both tasks.
• Phonological transparency of gender marking influenced gender monitoring but not word repetition, suggesting attention to gender is key.
• Semantic factors, including semantic gender, did not affect performance.
• Frequency and age of acquisition had minimal effects when other factors were controlled.

Conclusions:

• Phonological properties play a crucial role in Italian lexical access.
• Explicit attention to grammatical gender is necessary for utilizing phonological gender cues.
• Current lexical access models may need refinement to account for the role of gender and phonology.