Showing papers in "Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology in 2004"
TL;DR: Two experiments are reported here that demonstrate how an obligatory decomposition account can handle the absence of base frequency effects, and it is shown that the later stage of recombining the stem and affix is harder for high base frequency words than for lower base frequencyWords when matched on surface frequency, and that this can counterbalance the advantage of easier access to the higher frequency stem.
Abstract: If recognition of a polymorphemic word always takes place via its decomposition into stem and affix, then the higher the frequency of its stem (i.e., base frequency) the easier the lexical decision...
354 citations
TL;DR: The results support the conclusion that R–E compatibility reflects the impact of anticipatory effect representations in response production and specify ideo-motor theories of action control that assume movements to be controlled by anticipations of their sensorial effects.
Abstract: This study investigated the impact of contingent action effects on response production. In Experiment 1 responses of varying intensity were initiated faster when contingently followed by auditory e...
205 citations
TL;DR: The extent to which these notation–specific MARC and SNARC effects constrain current models of number processing is discussed and elaborate on the possible functional locus of the MARC effect.
Abstract: Number magnitude and number parity representation are fundamental number representations. However, the representation of parity is much less understood than that of magnitude: Therefore, we investi...
198 citations
TL;DR: Tapping in synchrony with auditory sequences containing a tempo change and continued tapping after sequence termination predicted period correction to be strongly dependent on all three variables, whereas phase correction depended only on intention.
Abstract: Adaptation to tempo changes in sensorimotor synchronization is hypothesized to rest on two processes, one (phase correction) being largely automatic and the other (period correction) requiring conscious awareness and attention. In this study, participants tapped their finger in synchrony with auditory sequences containing a tempo change and continued tapping after sequence termination. Their intention to adapt or not to adapt to the tempo change was manipulated through instructions, their attentional resources were varied by introducing a concurrent secondary task (mental arithmetic), and their awareness of the tempo changes was assessed through perceptual judgements. As predicted, period correction was found to be strongly dependent on all three variables, whereas phase correction depended only on intention.
175 citations
TL;DR: The purpose of the experiments reported in this paper was to test a response activation model of selective reaching conceived to account for variable results of movement trajectories caused by the activation levels of each competing response at the moment of response initiation.
Abstract: Consistent with action-based theories of attention, the presence of a nontarget stimulus in the environment has been shown to alter the characteristics of goal-directed movements. Specifically, it has been reported that movement trajectories veer away from (Howard & Tipper, 1997) or towards (Welsh, Elliott, & Weeks, 1999) the location of a nontarget stimulus. The purpose of the experiments reported in this paper was to test a response activation model of selective reaching conceived to account for these variable results. In agreement with the model, the trajectory changes in the movements appear to be determined by the activation levels of each competing response at the moment of response initiation. The results of the present work, as well as those of previous studies, are discussed within the framework of the model of response activation.
152 citations
TL;DR: This paper examined individual differences in deductive reasoning as a function of intellectual ability and thinking style and found that intellectual ability was a good predictor of logical performance on syllogisms, especially where there was a conflict between logic and believability.
Abstract: Three studies are reported, which examined individual differences in deductive reasoning as a function of intellectual ability and thinking style. Intellectual ability was a good predictor of logical performance on syllogisms, especially where there was a conflict between logic and believability. However, in the first two experiments there was no link between ability and performance on indicative selection tasks, in sharp contrast to previous research. This correlation did, however, return in the final study. Our data are consistent with the claim that the correlation with logical accuracy on abstract selection tasks is found primarily with participants of relatively high ability. At lower levels, pragmatically cued responses are given but those of slightly higher ability divorce the rule from the scenario and respond consistently (though incorrectly) across problems. Self-report questionnaires were generally poor predictors of performance, but a measure of the ability to generate alternative representations proved an excellent predictor. These results are consistent with a mental models approach to reasoning and also have implications for the debate about human rationality.
146 citations
TL;DR: The present studies aimed at investigating the inhibitory mechanisms responsible for successful performance in this task, testing a hypothesis of parallel programming of exogenous and endogenous components: a reflexive saccade to the stimulus is automatically programmed and competes with the concurrently established voluntary programme to look in the opposite direction.
Abstract: In the antisaccade task subjects are required to suppress the reflexive tendency to look at a peripherally presented stimulus and to perform a saccade in the opposite direction instead. The present studies aimed at investigating the inhibitory mechanisms responsible for successful performance in this task, testing a hypothesis of parallel programming of exogenous and endogenous components: A reflexive saccade to the stimulus is automatically programmed and competes with the concurrently established voluntary programme to look in the opposite direction. The experiments followed the logic of selectively manipulating the speed of processing of these components and testing the prediction that a selective slowing of the exogenous component should result in a reduced error rate in this task, while a selective slowing of the endogenous component should have the opposite effect. The results provide evidence for the hypothesis of parallel programming and are discussed in the context of alternative accounts of antisaccade performance.
135 citations
TL;DR: Two experiments used a sentence–picture verification task in which statements about photographs of natural scenes were read in order to make a true/false decision about the validity of the sentence, and in which eye movements were recorded.
Abstract: When we see combinations of text and graphics, such as photographs and their captions in printed media, how do we compare the information in the two components? Two experiments used a sentence-picture verification task in which statements about photographs of natural scenes were read in order to make a true/false decision about the validity of the sentence, and in which eye movements were recorded. In Experiment 1 the sentence and the picture were presented concurrently, and objects and words could be inspected in any order. In Experiment 2 the two components were presented one after the other, either picture first or sentence first. Fixation durations on pictures were characteristically longer than those on sentences in both experiments, and fixations on sentences varied according to whether they were being encoded as abstract propositions or as coreferents of objects depicted in a previously inspected picture. The decision time data present a difficulty for existing models of sentence verification tasks, with an inconsistent pattern of differences between true and false trials.
129 citations
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TL;DR: The distributed-representation account of lexical and object decision tasks predicts that performance on these tasks can never be normal in patients with an impaired semantic system, nor in patients who cannot access semantics normally from the stimulus domain being tested; however, numerous such patients have been reported in the literature, indicating that semantic access is not needed for normal performance onThese tasks.
Abstract: Many models of the processing of printed or spoken words or objects or faces propose that systems of local representations of the forms of such stimuli—lexicons—exist. This is denied by partisans o...
119 citations
TL;DR: The 5–year–olds judged visual stimuli as more variable than auditory ones, indicating that their temporal sensitivity was lower in the visual than in the auditory modality, and a theoretical model suggested that this modality effect was due to differences in the pacemaker speed of the internal clock.
Abstract: This experiment investigated the effect of modality on temporal discrimination in children aged 5 and 8 years and adults using a bisection task with visual and auditory stimuli ranging from 200 to 800 ms. In the first session, participants were required to compare stimulus durations with standard durations presented in the same modality (within-modality session), and in the second session in different modalities (cross-modal session). Psychophysical functions were orderly in all age groups, with the proportion of long responses (judgement that a duration was more similar to the long than to the short standard) increasing with the stimulus duration, although functions were flatter in the 5-year-olds than in the 8-year-olds and adults. Auditory stimuli were judged to be longer than visual stimuli in all age groups. The statistical results and a theoretical model suggested that this modality effect was due to differences in the pacemaker speed of the internal clock. The 5-year-olds also judged visual stimuli as more variable than auditory ones, indicating that their temporal sensitivity was lower in the visual than in the auditory modality.
115 citations
TL;DR: This Bartlett lecture narrates the discovery of blindsight and its mounting opposition, and it evaluates the continuing and often perplexing debate about its standing as a visual cognitive phenomenon.
Abstract: Blindsight is the ability, still controversial if a vote is taken, of subjects with clinically blind field defects to detect, localize, and discriminate visual stimuli of which the subjects say the...
TL;DR: Receptive switching was associated with early switch-related activity over central sensors that were not language specific, and the frontal and parietal switch related activity reported in the productive switching task was absent.
Abstract: Previous research has shown large response time costs (in excess of 50 ms) when bilingual speakers switch predictably back and forth between naming items (a productive switching task) in their first (L1) and second languages (L2). A recent study using event-related potentials (ERPs) has shown that switching between languages is associated with activity over frontal (N2) and parietal (late positive complex) areas of cortex (Jackson, Swainson, Cunnington, & Jackson, 2001). Switching between naming in different languages requires a switch in both language representations and language-specific motor responses. The current study investigated a receptive (input) language-switching task with a common manual response. Number words were presented in L1 and L2, and participants were required to judge whether the words were odd or even (a parity judgement). Response costs were considerably reduced, and the frontal and parietal switch related activity reported in the productive switching task was absent. Receptive switching was associated with early switch-related activity over central sensors that were not language specific. These results are discussed in relation to the idea that there is no language-specific lexical selection mechanism. Instead the costs of receptive language switching may arise from outside the bilingual lexicon.
TL;DR: Evidence is presented from a series of experiments employing the methods of both literatures suggesting that people make a systematic distinction between two types of deontic rule: social contracts and precautions.
Abstract: Deontic reasoning has been studied in two subfields of psychology: the cognitive and moral reasoning literatures. These literatures have drawn different conclusions about the nature of deontic reasoning. The consensus within the cognitive reasoning literature is that deontic reasoning is a unitary phenomenon, whereas the consensus within the moral reasoning literature is that there are different subdomains of deontic reasoning. We present evidence from a series of experiments employing the methods of both literatures suggesting that people make a systematic distinction between two types of deontic rule: social contracts and precautions. The results call into question the prevailing opinion in the cognitive reasoning literature and provide further support for both an evolutionary view of deontic reasoning and the more domain-specific perspective found in the moral reasoning literature.
TL;DR: In speeded search tasks, the subject's own name was detected more quickly than other targets, but in no case were search slopes flat enough to suggest parallel search or “pop-out”, evidence that search for “high-priority” word targets is subject to the same severe capacity limitations as those that are found with search for neutral words.
Abstract: Previous research offers conflicting suggestions about whether "high-priority" verbal stimuli such as an individual's own name or emotionally charged words automatically grab attention and/or can be detected without the usual capacity limitations. Nine experiments investigated this issue, using visual search through displays of words. In speeded search tasks, the subject's own name was detected more quickly than other targets, but in no case were search slopes flat enough to suggest parallel search or "pop-out". Further, names were not found to be unusually potent distractors. Emotionally charged words were neither more readily detected as targets nor more potent as distractors than neutral words. A comparison of observers' accuracy in searching briefly exposed simultaneous vs. successive displays provided further evidence that search for "highpriority" word targets is subject to the same severe capacity limitations as those that are found with search for neutral words. People sometimes seem, rather uncannily, to notice when their name is mentioned in a conversation, even if they were not consciously attending to this conversation. Often, they say, it is as if the name seems to "jump out". Similar effects have been reported with emotion-laden words and voices. The literature on the cognitive processing of such highpriority affective stimuli is somewhat confusing, however, with various conflicting results scattered around the literature. This paper describes a series of experiments undertaken to try to clarify the ways in which high-priority stimuli may be processed differently from other stimuli within the context of a particular task: speeded or unspeeded visual search through displays of words. Aside from their intrinsic interest, the effects of high-priority affective stimuli may shed light on a number of issues. One is the long-running controversy over the extent to which unattended stimuli are processed to a semantic level, as suggested by "late-selection" theories. While many writers have advocated compromise formulations (Johnston & Dark, 1982; Lavie
TL;DR: People with larger working memory capacities reasoned better and the responses made by people with larger capacities were more likely to correspond to the predictions made by both mental model theory and the probability heuristics model.
Abstract: The purpose of this study was to examine the relation between working memory span and syllogistic reasoning performance. In addition, performance for the reasoning task was compared to predictions made by mental model theory and the probability heuristics model. According to mental model theory, syllogisms that require the use of more mental models are more difficult. According to the probability heuristics model difficulty is related to the number of probabilistic heuristics that must be applied, or (for invalid syllogisms) inconsistencies between the derived and correct conclusion. The predictions of these theories were examined across two experiments. In general, people with larger working memory capacities reasoned better. Also, the responses made by people with larger capacities were more likely to correspond to the predictions made by both mental model theory and the probability heuristics model. Relations between working memory span and performance were also consistent with both theories.
TL;DR: Overall, these findings suggest that in the long term the detrimental effects of an opaque orthography are most damaging to the poorest readers.
Abstract: Spencer and Hanley (2003) showed that Welsh-speaking children aged between 5 and 7 years who were learning to read Welsh (a transparent orthography) performed significantly better at reading both real words and nonwords than did English-speaking children living in Wales who were learning to read English (a deep orthography). In this study, the reading skills of these children were reexamined three years later, during their sixth year of formal reading instruction. The children learning to read English continued to perform poorly at reading low- and medium-frequency irregular words but no differences were observed in reading regular words or nonwords. These findings emphasize how long it takes to acquire a large sight vocabulary in English, but indicated that the reading skills of the majority of the English-speaking children had caught up with those of their Welsh-speaking counterparts. However, the poorest 25% of the English readers continued to perform much worse than the lowest performing 25% of Welsh ...
TL;DR: The results indicated that the illusion was reported as both familiarity and recollection, and the implications of illusory recollection are discussed in terms of dual–process, fuzzy–trace, two–criteria signal detection models and attribution models of recognition memory.
Abstract: Higham and Vokey (2000, Exps.1 & 3)demonstrated that a slight increase in the display duration of a briefly presented word prior to displaying it in the clear for a recognition response increased the bias to respond "old". In the current research, three experiments investigated the phenomenology associated with this illusion of memory using the standard remember-know procedure and a new, independent-scales methodology. Contrary to expectations based on the fluency heuristic, which predicts effects of display duration on subjective familiarity only, the results indicated that the illusion was reported as both familiarity and recollection. Furthermore, manipulations of prime duration induced reports of false recollection in all experiments. The results--in particular, the implications of illusory recollection--are discussed in terms of dual-process, fuzzy-trace, two-criteria signal detection models and attribution models of recognition memory.
TL;DR: The results indicate that the capacity of the working- memory system that is measured by standard working-memory tests does not determine the efficiency of on-line syntactic processing, and are consistent with the view that theWorking-memory system used for parsing is at least partially separate from that measured by traditional measures of working- Memory capacity.
Abstract: Two experiments investigated the relationship between performance on standard tests of verbal working‐memory and the on‐line construction of syntactic form. In Experiment 1, working‐memory was measured in 100 college students on a version of the Daneman and Carpenter (1980) reading‐span task, and online syntactic processing was assessed using a self‐paced listening task with four sentence types. In Experiment 2, working‐memory was measured in 48 college students on two versions of the reading‐span task and two other tests of verbal working‐memory, and on‐line syntactic processing was assessed using the self‐paced listening task with an additional sentence type. In both experiments, there was no relationship between working‐memory capacity and the increase in processing time seen for the on‐line construction of syntactic form for either syntactically more complex or syntactically simpler sentences. The results indicate that the capacity of the working‐memory system that is measured by standard working‐memo...
TL;DR: Overall, the mixing effects suggest that elimination or reduction of compatibility effects occurs primarily when the stimulus-response sets have both conceptual and perceptual similarity.
Abstract: In two-choice tasks, the compatible mapping of left stimulus to left response and right stimulus to right response typically yields better performance than does the incompatible mapping. Nonetheless, when compatible and incompatible mappings are mixed within a block of trials, the spatial compatibility effect is eliminated. Two experiments evaluated whether the elimination of compatibility effects by mixing compatible and incompatible mappings is a general or specific phenomenon. Left-right physical locations, arrow directions, and location words were mapped to keypress responses in Experiment 1 and vocal responses in Experiment 2. With keypresses, mixing compatible and incompatible mappings eliminated the compatibility effect for physical locations and arrow directions, but enhanced it for words. With vocal responses, mixing significantly reduced the compatibility effect only for words. Overall, the mixing effects suggest that elimination or reduction of compatibility effects occurs primarily when the stimulus-response sets have both conceptual and perceptual similarity. This elimination may be due to suppression of a direct response-selection route, but to account for the full pattern of mixing effects it is also necessary to consider changes in an indirect response-selection route and the temporal activation properties of different stimulus-response sets.
TL;DR: The findings highlight that different task characteristics influence performance dependent upon the nature of task presentation and enable an investigation of whether participants' reasoning on the syllogistic reasoning task is guided by the conclusion or the premises.
Abstract: Belief bias is the tendency to be influenced by the believability of the conclusion when attempting to solve a syllogistic reasoning problem Figural bias is the tendency to be influenced by the order in which the information is presented in the premises when attempting to solve a syllogistic reasoning problem When studied simultaneously they enable an investigation of whether participants' reasoning on the syllogistic reasoning task is guided by the conclusion (backward reasoning) or the premises (forward reasoning) Experiments 1 and 2 found evidence of belief bias but not figural bias on the syllogistic evaluation task paradigm Experiments 3 and 4 found evidence of figural bias but not belief bias on the syllogistic production task paradigm The findings highlight that different task characteristics influence performance dependent upon the nature of task presentation These findings are discussed in the context of current theories of belief bias in syllogistic reasoning
TL;DR: It was concluded that efficient working–memory performance is related to the temporary reduction of activation of irrelevant information but does not imply its elimination from memory.
Abstract: The study explored, from an individual differences point of view, what happens to information to be suppressed in a working-memory task at short and long term. In particular, it was examined whether control mechanisms of irrelevant information in working memory imply their complete elimination from working memory or just the modulation of their activation. To this end, we compared the fate of irrelevant information in groups of subjects with high and low reading comprehension (Experiments 1 and 2) and subjects with high and low working memory (Experiments 1, 2, 3, and 4). All the experiments presented a working-memory task devised by De Beni, Palladino, Pazzaglia, and Cornoldi (1998), which required participants to process lists of words, to tap when a word from a particular category was presented, and then to recall only the last items in each list. Results confirmed that participants with high reading comprehension also have higher working memory and make less intrusion errors due to irrelevant items that have to be processed but then discarded. Furthermore, it was found that participants with low working memory have slightly better implicit (Experiment 1) and explicit memory (Experiments 3 and 4) of highly activated irrelevant information. Nevertheless, in a long-term recognition test, participants with high and low reading comprehension/working memory presented a similar pattern of memory for different types of irrelevant information (Experiment 2), whereas in a short-term memory recognition test, low-span participants presented a facilitation effect in the time required for the recognition of highly activated irrelevant information (Experiment 4). It was concluded that efficient working-memory performance is related to the temporary reduction of activation of irrelevant information but does not imply its elimination from memory.
TL;DR: Three experiments addressed abstractionist versus exemplar-based theories of the visual representations underlying word priming and suggested a resolution to these differing perspectives that relatively independent neural subsystems operate in parallel to underlie abstract-category and specific-exemplar priming of word forms.
Abstract: Three experiments addressed abstractionist versus exemplar‐based theories of the visual representations underlying word priming. Participants first read centrally presented whole words (each displayed in all lowercase or in all uppercase letters), and then they completed laterally presented word stems (each displayed in all lowercase or in all uppercase letters). Word stem completion priming was letter‐case specific (greater for same‐case primed items than for different‐case primed items) when stems were presented directly to the right cerebral hemisphere but not when stems were presented directly to the left cerebral hemisphere. This interaction was not influenced by the typicality of the test stems, but it was observed only for stems composed of letters with visually dissimilar lowercase and uppercase structures (e.g., bea/BEA) and not for stems composed of letters with visually similar lowercase and uppercase structures (e.g., sco/SCO). In contrast, cued recall was letter‐case specific when similar‐cas...
TL;DR: Results demonstrate that visual speech can assist in the analysis of clearly presented auditory stimuli in tasks concerned with information provided by viewing the production of an utterance, and suggest that viewing a talker speaking will activate speech motor schemas in the perceiver.
Abstract: The effects of viewing the face of the talker (visual speech) on the processing of clearly presented intact auditory stimuli were investigated using two measures likely to be sensitive to the articulatory motor actions produced in speaking. The aim of these experiments was to highlight the need for accounts of the effects of audio-visual (AV) speech that explicitly consider the properties of articulated action. The first experiment employed a syllable-monitoring task in which participants were required to monitor for target syllables within foreign carrier phrases. An AV effect was found in that seeing a talker's moving face (moving face condition) assisted in more accurate recognition (hits and correct rejections) of spoken syllables than of auditory-only still face (still face condition) presentations. The second experiment examined processing of spoken phrases by investigating whether an AV effect would be found for estimates of phrase duration. Two effects of seeing the moving face of the talker were found. First, the moving face condition had significantly longer duration estimates than the still face auditory-only condition. Second, estimates of auditory duration made in the moving face condition reliably correlated with the actual durations whereas those made in the still face auditory condition did not. The third experiment was carried out to determine whether the stronger correlation between estimated and actual duration in the moving face condition might have been due to generic properties of AV presentation. Experiment 3 employed the procedures of the second experiment but used stimuli that were not perceived as speech although they possessed the same timing cues as those of the speech stimuli of Experiment 2. It was found that simply presenting both auditory and visual timing information did not result in more reliable duration estimates. Further, when released from the speech context (used in Experiment 2), duration estimates for the auditory-only stimuli were significantly correlated with actual durations. In all, these results demonstrate that visual speech can assist in the analysis of clearly presented auditory stimuli in tasks concerned with information provided by viewing the production of an utterance. We suggest that these findings are consistent with there being a processing link between perception and action such that viewing a talker speaking will activate speech motor schemas in the perceiver.
TL;DR: It is concluded that, at least with the kind of stimuli used here, the display-size method combined with the zero-slope criterion is less than ideal for investigating how static discontinuities can affect the automatic deployment of visual attention.
Abstract: Four experiments examined attentional capture by colour as assessed by two different investigative methods. Subjects performed a visual search task for a vertical-target line embedded among tilted-distractor lines, presented inside 4, 8, or 12 coloured discs. Interestingly, when the colour singleton was task irrelevant, and data were analysed by means of the display-size method combined with the zero-slope criterion, no evidence for attentional capture by colour was found. However, when data were analysed by means of the distance method, which consists of monitoring the spatial relationship between the target and the singleton, results showed that the target was found faster and/or more accurately when it was inside the singleton than when it was in a nonsingleton location. This provided evidence for a stimulus-driven attentional capture. In addition, the application of signal detection methodology showed that attentional capture, as revealed by the distance method, resulted from a perceptual modulation at the singleton location, rather than from a criterion shift. We conclude that, at least with the kind of stimuli used here, the display-size method combined with the zero-slope criterion is less than ideal for investigating how static discontinuities can affect the automatic deployment of visual attention.
TL;DR: It is shown that regions of parieto–occipital cortex are selectively activated in a preview search condition relative to a detection baseline and these regions also increase in activation as the preview interval increases (and search then becomes easier), consistent with them modulating the parallel filtering of distractors from targets in spatial search.
Abstract: Search for a colour-form conjunction target can be facilitated by presenting one set of distractors prior to the second set of distractors and the target: the preview benefit (Watson & Humphreys, 1997). The early presentation of one set of distractors enables them to be efficiently filtered from search. We report two studies investigating the time course of the preview benefit. In Experiment 1 we use a standard reaction time analysis to show that the benefit has a relatively slow time course; old items need to precede the new set by 600 ms or more in order to be fully filtered from search. Furthermore, the reductions in reaction time across time in the preview condition varied nonlinearly with the display size, suggesting that old items were discounted from search in parallel. In Experiment 2 we examined the neural locus of this filtering effect over time, using positron emission tomography (PET). We show that regions of parieto-occipital cortex are selectively activated in a preview search condition relative to a detection baseline. These regions also increase in activation as the preview interval increases (and search then becomes easier), consistent with them modulating the parallel filtering of distractors from targets in spatial search. Interestingly, the same areas as those activated in preview search were also active in conjunction search relative to its own detection baseline. Thus these regions either modulate parallel filtering in conjunction search too, or they modulate different behavioural functions according to task constraints.
TL;DR: Analyses of the premise processing times, answering times and accuracy show that the annotated model yields the best fit of the data, and implications for the mental model theory as developed for relational reasoning are discussed.
Abstract: According to the mental model theory, reasoners build an initial model representing the information given in the premises. In the context of relational reasoning, the question arises as to which kind of representation is used to cope with indeterminate or multimodel problems. The present article presents an array of possible answers arising from the initial construction of complete explicit models, partial explicit models, partial implicit models, a single “isomeric” model, or a single annotated model. Predictions generated from these views are tested in two experiments that vary the problem structure and the number of models consistent with the premises. Analyses of the premise processing times, answering times and accuracy show that the annotated model yields the best fit of the data. Implications of these findings for the mental model theory as developed for relational reasoning are discussed.
TL;DR: The results contribute to evidence that abstract constraints, not derived from peripheral speech or hearing mechanisms, govern the organization of linguistic knowledge; and statistical redundancy could not explain the deaf results.
Abstract: Syllable structure influences hearing students’ reading and spelling (e.g., Badecker, 1996; Caramazza & Miceli, 1990; Prinzmetal, Treiman, & Rho, 1986; Rapp, 1992; Treiman & Zukowski, 1988). This may seem unsurprising since hearers closely associate written and spoken words. We analysed a corpus of spelling errors made by deaf students. They would have learned English orthography with an attenuated experience of speech. We found that the majority of their errors were phonologically implausible but orthographically legal. A tendency to replace uncommon letter sequences with common sequences could not account for this pattern, nor could residual influence from speech. Since syllabically defined constraints are required to keep sequences orthographically legal, the deaf data are marked by an influence of syllable structure. Two main conclusions follow: (1) Our results contribute to evidence that abstract constraints, not derived from peripheral speech or hearing mechanisms, govern the organization of linguistic knowledge; and (2) statistical redundancy could not explain the deaf results. It does not offer a general alternative to suprasegmental structure.
TL;DR: An account for the modulation of combined expectancies by the relation between cues is suggested in terms of the adjusted expectancy model.
Abstract: Studies of combined expectancies have shown that spatial cueing effects are reduced on trials on which participants have to respond with an unexpected motor response. In the first two experiments the range of reduced expectancy effects is examined. Advance knowledge of the likely response was combined in a trial-by-trial procedure with modality cueing, object cueing, and task cueing. Effects of modality cueing were reduced on trials on which the target requested an unexpected response. However, effects of object cueing as well as effects of task cueing were unaffected by response cueing. Comparing experiments revealed that different types of cues were used in different experiments. To test the effect of type of cue on the interaction of expectancies the third experiment combined spatial cueing with response cueing. When integrated cues were used that cued the likely target location by an arrow and the likely response by an arrow too, spatial cueing effects were reduced on trials with unexpected responses. However, spatial cueing effects remained unaffected by response cueing when separated cues were used consisting in a word cueing the response and an arrow cueing target location. An account for the modulation of combined expectancies by the relation between cues is suggested in terms of the adjusted expectancy model.
TL;DR: It is found that feedforward and feedback inconsistent words were processed more slowly than consistent words, regardless of word frequency, indicating that both types of consistency are involved in visual word recognition.
Abstract: In three experiments, we examined feedforward and feedback consistency effects in word recognition. Feedforward consistency is the degree to which a word's pronunciation is consistent with that of similarly spelled words, and feedback consistency refers to whether there is more than one way to spell a pronunciation. Previously, Stone, Vanhoy, and Van Orden (1997) reported feedforward and feedback consistency effects for low-frequency words in a lexical decision task. We investigated the effect of feedforward and feedback consistency for both high- and low-frequency words in lexical decision and naming. In both tasks, we found that feedforward and feedback inconsistent words were processed more slowly than consistent words, regardless of word frequency. These findings indicate that both types of consistency are involved in visual word recognition.
TL;DR: The ICE model account of environmental context (EC)-dependent recognition memory is described, and new predictions concerning the effect of multiple presentation ECs are derived, and support for the cue-overload hypothesis is obtained.
Abstract: The ICE model account (e.g., Murnane & Phelps, 1993; Murnane, Phelps, & Malmberg, 1999) of environmental context (EC)-dependent recognition memory is described, and new predictions concerning the effect of multiple presentation ECs are derived. Experiment 1 tested the ICE model predictions in relation to predictions derived from the cue-overload hypothesis (e.g., Watkins, 1979). In addition, the sensitivity of recognition reaction time (RT) as a measure of EC-dependent memory effects was examined. Minimal support was obtained for the ICE model, but greater support was provided for the cue-overload hypothesis. In Experiment 2, further manipulations were employed to test ICE model predictions and the cue-overload hypothesis, with relevance to the mental reinstatement and outshining hypotheses. Again support for the cue-overload hypothesis was obtained, and an EC reinstatement effect with RTs was detected. The ICE model is considered in respect of these findings.