Primed-lexical decision: The effect of varying the stimulus-onset asynchrony of prime and target

doi:10.1016/0001-6918(86)90019-3

Acta Psychologica

Volume 61, Issue 1, 1986, Pages 17-36

https://doi.org/10.1016/0001-6918(86)90019-3 Get rights and content

Abstract

Lexical decisions to word targets are usually faster when they are preceded by associatively related word primes than when they follow a neutral prime. Also; it has been shown that, under certain circumstances, lexical decisions to words preceded by unassociated word primes are slower than those to words following a neutral prime. The present study explores the influence of the stimulus-onset asynchrony (SOA) of prime and target on these priming effects. Eleven SOAs were investigated ranging from 100 msec to 1240 msec. The facilitatory effect of related primes was reliable in all SOA conditions. The inhibitory effect of unrelated primes was reliable in all but one SOA condition. Furthermore, it was found that, up to the longest SOA, facilitation increases with SOA, whereas inhibition remains virtually constant. In the longest SOA condition both facilitation and inhibition decrease. Yet another finding was that pseudowords following non-neutral primes were processed faster than those preceded by neutral primes, except with the two shortest SOAs. It appears that the SOA data cannot be satisfactorily interpreted in terms of actual priming processes, that is, processes that prepare subsequent word recognition, and that some experimental artifacts may partly have been responsible for the observed pattern of results.

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Cited by (41)

Auditory semantic priming and the dichotic right ear advantage
2019, Brain and Cognition
Citation Excerpt :
The dependent variables were the proportion of reports for each ear (number of reports from each ear divided by the maximum score of 40; accuracy hereafter) and response time in milliseconds. Note that, although we do not have specific hypothesis about SOA, it was considered as an exploratory variable in our novel paradigm in view of its importance in previous work (Abernethy & Coney, 1993; de Groot et al., 1986; Koivisto, 1999). For the analysis of response time, only correct responses (i.e., reports for a specific ear) were included in the analysis.
The current study presents two experiments that aimed to explore the effects of auditory semantic priming on the dichotic right ear advantage. In Experiment 1, a classic fused dichotic words task was modified with the addition of auditory associative primes with three levels of relatedness (right, left, or neither ear). In Experiment 2, a new dichotic listening task was developed based on a binaural task used in a published auditory priming study. In both experiments, we expected that priming would produce a large right ear advantage when related to the right ear target but that the magnitude of this advantage would decrease for left ear related targets. Although evidence of priming (faster responses for related than unrelated primes) was found in both experiments, only Experiment 2 confirmed our prediction of an ear by prime relatedness interaction. Results are interpreted in the context of models concerned with the role of each cerebral hemisphere in semantic processing as well as models of perceptual asymmetries.
Pathways to meaning: Written and spoken word priming in children with ASD versus typically developing peers
2014, Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders
Citation Excerpt :
Firstly, manipulations of relatedness proportion or instructions can evoke the generation of expectancies regarding the target. Secondly, a ‘post-lexical semantic matching’ strategy can occur, based on retrospectively determining whether there is a relationship between the target and the prime, and subsequently biasing lexical decision responses (Cree et al., 1999; de Groot et al., 1986; McRae & Boisvert, 1998; Neely, 1991). Lexical decisions in the related condition benefit from this bias.
Visual supports are widely utilized with children on the autism spectrum, however, the effect of visual versus auditory modality on language comprehension has not been directly investigated. To address this issue, we utilized a semantic priming paradigm in two experiments with 18 children with ASD and no language impairment and 14 children with typical development. In the first, cross-modal experiment with a spoken word prime, no priming effect was identified. In the second, uni-modal written word prime experiment, a three-way interaction was identified. Subsequent analysis revealed that priming occurred only in the younger participants with ASD. These results are discussed in terms of the cross- and uni-modal demands of the two experiments and in light of lexical processing of spoken and written words within a developmental framework.
Prospective and retrospective processing in associative mediated priming
2012, Journal of Memory and Language
Citation Excerpt :
In turn, the slower target RTs in the neutral prime condition yielded artificially larger priming effects in Experiment 3. The slower target RTs following unrelated compared to neutral primes has also been found in prior direct and mediated priming studies (e.g., de Groot et al., 1986; Jones, 2010). As noted by Antos (1979), the use of non-linguistic primes (e.g., +++++++), may lead participants to initially regard the target as the prime, thereby adding a few milliseconds to the target RTs.
Mediated priming refers to the faster word recognition of a target (e.g., milk) following presentation of a prime (e.g., pasture) that is related indirectly via a connecting “mediator” (e.g., cow). Association strength may be an important factor in whether mediated priming occurs prospectively (with target activation prior to its presentation) or retrospectively. Mediated priming effects were compared for items having a strong (e.g., iceberg – cold – hot) versus weak (e.g., camel – desert – hot) mediator–target association. Priming obtained for both strong and weak mediator–target association conditions in lexical decision tasks (LDTs) conducive to retrospective processing, but only for the stronger items in more automatic LDTs. Results extend recent findings of mediated priming via retrospective processing (e.g., Jones, 2010), and further suggest that a strong mediator–target association is necessary in order for mediated priming to occur prospectively by spreading activation.
Letter search and relatedness proportion: Further electrophysiological evidence for the automaticity of semantic activation
2010, Neuroscience Letters
Automatic semantic activation was recently called a myth when the behavioral semantic priming effect was found to be subject to task demands. Semantic priming effects as measured by lexical decision times are typically reduced to the point of being absent when a letter search has to be performed on the prime word. It seems premature to draw any definite conclusion from this behavioral result as ERP recordings show that the same prime task leaves N400 priming effects unaffected. It is still a matter of debate whether N400 priming effects are generated chiefly by automatic or by cognitively controlled priming processes. In the present study we therefore recorded both lexical decision times and ERPs while we varied the ratio of related to unrelated prime–probe pairs (25% vs. 75% related) and thus manipulated the degree to which controlled mechanisms contribute to the semantic priming effect. Behavioral measures revealed reliable semantic priming effects only when RP was high and the influence of controlled processes hence increased. The modulation of the N400, however, provided clear-cut evidence of semantic processing at both RPs, indicating that semantic activation occurred even when RP was low and the involvement of controlled mechanisms was thus minimal.
Letter search does not affect semantic priming in a probe naming task
2008, Acta Psychologica
Citation Excerpt :
A semantic match biases a subsequent word response, while the absence of a semantic relation biases a non-word response. The notion of an additional process that is automatic in nature is supported by demonstrations of semantic priming at extremely short stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) that presumably do not allow for the implementation of cognitively controlled mechanisms (e.g., De Groot, Thomassen, & Hudson, 1986; Neely, 1976). Additionally semantic priming has been observed, when subjects were unaware of the associative relationship between prime and probe (e.g., Fischler, 1977) or even unaware of the mere presence of the prime itself (e.g., Draine & Greenwald, 1998; Hirshman & Durante, 1992).
The normally robust semantic priming effect observed in lexical decision is usually reduced to the point of being absent, when a letter search has to be performed on the prime. It has been argued that semantic activation is thus not an automatic process but rather cognitively controlled and therefore adaptable to task demands. We examined the effects of letter search priming on pronunciation times and found a reliable semantic priming effect, following letter search that was not affected at all relative to a standard condition, where participants silently read the prime. Thus the nature of the prime task did not seem to affect the processing mode employed, semantic access occurred even though attention was focused on surface properties of the prime.
Double-decision lexical tasks in thought-disordered schizophrenic patients: A path towards cognitive remediation?
2005, Brain and Language
It has been shown that schizophrenics have certain difficulties in the processing of semantic context. These difficulties have usually been evaluated using lexical decision tasks with semantic priming. In this study, we chose to examine the idea of an abnormality in the early stages of semantic context processing in thought-disordered schizophrenics using two double lexical decision tasks: one with a high (25%) and one with a low (15%) proportion of related words to assess the participants’ competency in controlled and possibly also more automatic context processing. The results obtained in 40 control participants and 40 schizophrenic patients revealed no significant differences in the amplitude of semantic priming between the two groups. These results suggest that, in the disorganized schizophrenic subjects evaluated in this study, the context processing processes mobilized by the employed tasks were unimpaired.

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^☆: This research was supported by the Netherlands Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research (ZWO).

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Primed-lexical decision: The effect of varying the stimulus-onset asynchrony of prime and target☆

Abstract

Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior

Processing facilitation in a lexical decision task

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance

A spreading-activation theory of semantic processing

Psychological Review

Mondelinge woordassociatienormen: 100 woordassociaties op 460 Nederlandse'zelfstandige naamwoorden

Primed lexical decision: combined effects of the proportion of related prime-target pairs and the stimulus-onset asynchrony of prime and target

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

Word-context effects in word naming and lexical decision

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

Contexteffecten bij visuele woordherkenning en latere stadia van woordverwerking

Associative facilitation of word recognition as measured from a neutral prime

Memory and Cognition

Latency of associative activation in memory

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance

Accessing the mental lexicon

Levels of processing and the structure of the language processor

Priming and the effects of sentence and lexical contexts on naming time: evidence for autonomous lexical processing

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology