When words and space collide: Spatial attention interacts with lexical access during word recognition

ABSTRACTFour eye movement experiments investigated whether readers use parafoveal input to gain information about the phonological or orthographic forms of consonants, vowels, and tones in word recognition when reading Thai silently. Target words were presented in sentences preceded by parafoveal previews in which consonant, vowel, or tone information was manipulated. Previews of homophonous consonants (Experiment 1) and concordant vowels (Experiment 2) did not substantially facilitate processing of the target word, whereas the identical previews did. Hence, orthography appears to be playing the prominent role in early word recognition for consonants and vowels. Incorrect tone marker previews (Experiment 3) substantially retarded the subsequent processing of the target word, indicating that lexical tone plays an important role in early word recognition. Vowels in VOP (Experiment 4) did not facilitate processing, which points to vowel position being a significant factor. Primarily, orthographic codes of consonants and vowels (HOP) in conjunction with tone information are assembled from parafoveal input and used for early lexical access.

Download Full-text

Interactive Activation in Visual Word Recognition: Constraints Imposed by the Joint Effects of Spatial Attention and Semantics.

Journal of Experimental Psychology Human Perception & Performance ◽

10.1037/0096-1523.30.6.1064 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 30 (6) ◽

pp. 1064-1076 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Jennifer A. Stolz ◽

Biljana Stevanovski

Keyword(s):

Word Recognition ◽

Spatial Attention ◽

Visual Word Recognition ◽

Visual Word ◽

Joint Effects ◽

Interactive Activation

Download Full-text

Perceptual flexibility in word recognition: Strategies affect orthographic computation but not lexical access.

Journal of Experimental Psychology Human Perception & Performance ◽

10.1037/0096-1523.4.4.674 ◽

1978 ◽

Vol 4 (4) ◽

pp. 674-690 ◽

Cited By ~ 29

Author(s):

Thomas H. Carr ◽

Brian J. Davidson ◽

Harold L. Hawkins

Keyword(s):

Word Recognition ◽

Lexical Access

Download Full-text

The influence of sentence context and accented speech on lexical access in second-language auditory word recognition

Bilingualism Language and Cognition ◽

10.1017/s1366728912000508 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 16 (3) ◽

pp. 508-517 ◽

Cited By ~ 26

Author(s):

EVELYNE LAGROU ◽

ROBERT J. HARTSUIKER ◽

WOUTER DUYCK

Keyword(s):

Second Language ◽

Word Recognition ◽

Lexical Access ◽

Sentence Context ◽

Decision Task ◽

Semantic Constraint ◽

Accented Speech ◽

Auditory Lexical Decision ◽

Auditory Word ◽

Auditory Word Recognition

Until now, research on bilingual auditory word recognition has been scarce, and although most studies agree that lexical access is language-nonselective, there is less consensus with respect to the influence of potentially constraining factors. The present study investigated the influence of three possible constraints. We tested whether language nonselectivity is restricted by (a) a sentence context in a second language (L2), (b) the semantic constraint of the sentence, and (c) the native language of the speaker. Dutch–English bilinguals completed an English auditory lexical decision task on the last word of low- and high-constraining sentences. Sentences were pronounced by a native Dutch speaker with English as the L2, or by a native English speaker with Dutch as the L2. Interlingual homophones (e.g., lief “sweet” – leaf /liːf/) were always recognized more slowly than control words. The semantic constraint of the sentence and the native accent of the speaker modulated, but did not eliminate interlingual homophone effects. These results are discussed within language-nonselective models of lexical access in bilingual auditory word recognition.

Download Full-text