Abstract
How should a word’s orthographic neighborhood affect perceptual identification and semantic categorization, both of which require a word to be uniquely identified? According to the multiple read-out model (Grainger & Jacobs, 1996), inhibitory neighborhood frequency effects should be observed in these types of tasks, and facilitatory neighborhood size effects should not be. In Experiments 1 and 2 (perceptual identification), these effects were examined as a function of stimulus visibility (i.e., high vs. low visibility) to provide as full a test as possible of the model’s predictions. In the high-visibility conditions, words with large neighborhoods were reported less accurately than words with small neighborhoods, but there was no effect of neighborhood frequency (i.e., whether the word had a higher frequency neighbor). In the low-visibility conditions, low-frequency words with large neighborhoods and low-frequency words with higher frequency neighbors showed superior identification performance. In the semantic categorization task (Experiment 3), words with large neighborhoods were responded to more rapidly than words with small neighborhoods, but there was no effect of neighbor-hood frequency. These results are inconsistent with two of the basic premises of the multiple read-out model—namely, that facilitatory neighborhood size effects are due to a variable response criterion (the Σ criterion), rather than to lexical selection processes, and that the lexical selection processes themselves produce an inhibitory neighborhood frequency effect (via the M criterion). Instead, the present results, in conjunction with previous findings, suggest that large neighborhoods (and perhaps higher frequency neighbors) do aid lexical selection.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Andrews, S. (1989). Frequency and neighborhood effects on lexical access: Activation or search?Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,15, 802–814.
Andrews, S. (1992). Frequency and neighborhood effects on lexical access: Lexical similarity or orthographic redundancy?Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,18, 234–254.
Andrews, S. (1997). The effect of orthographic similarity on lexical retrieval: Resolving neighborhood conflicts.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,4, 439–461.
Bradley, D. A., &Forster, K. I. (1987). A reader’s view of listening.Cognition,25, 103–134.
Carreiras, M., Perea, M., &Grainger, J. (1997). Effects of orthographic neighborhood in visual word recognition: Cross-task comparisons.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,23, 857–871.
Clark, H. H. (1973). The language-as-a-fixed-effect fallacy: A critique of language statistics in psychological research.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,12, 335–359.
Cohen, J. (1976). Random means random.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,15, 261–262.
Coltheart, M., Davelaar, E., Jonasson, J. T., &Besner, D. (1977). Access to the internal lexicon. In S. Domic (Ed.),Attention and performance VI (pp. 535–555). New York: Academic Press.
Forster, K. I. (1976). Accessing the mental lexicon. In R. J. Wales & E. W. Walker (Eds.),New approaches to language mechanisms (pp. 257–287). Amsterdam: North-Holland.
Forster, K. I., &Shen, D. (1996). No enemies in the neighborhood: Absence of inhibitory neighborhood effects in lexical decision and semantic categorization.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,22, 696–713.
Grainger, J. (1990). Word frequency and neighborhood frequency effects in lexical decision and naming.Journal of Memory & Language,29, 228–244.
Grainger, J., &Jacobs, A. M. (1996). Orthographic processing in visual word recognition: A multiple read-out model.Psychological Review,103, 518–565.
Grainger.J., O’Regan, J. K., Jacobs, A. M., &Segui, J. (1989). On the role of competing word units in visual word recognition: The neighborhood frequency effect.Perception & Psychophysics,45, 189–195.
Grainger, J., &Segui, J. (1990). Neighborhood frequency effects in visual word recognition: A comparison of lexical decision and masked identification latencies.Perception & Psychophysics,47, 191–198.
Johnson, N. F., &Pugh, K. R. (1994). A cohort model of visual word recognition.Cognitive Psychology,26, 240–346.
Keppel, G. (1976). Words as random variables.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,15, 263–265.
Kučera, H., &Francis, W. N. (1967).Computational analysis of present-day American English. Providence, RI: Brown University Press.
Lima, S. D., &Inhoff, A. W. (1985). Lexical access during eye fixations in reading: Effects of word-initial letter sequence.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,11, 272–285.
Luo, C. R., &Snodgrass, J. G. (1994). Competitive activation model of perceptual interference in picture and word identification.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,20, 50–60.
McClelland, J. L., &Rumelhart, D. E. (1981). An interactive-activation model of context effects in letter perception: Pt. 1. An account of basic findings.Psychological Review,88, 375–407.
Paap, K. R., &Johansen, L. S. (1994). The case for the vanishing frequency effect: A retest of the verification model.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,20, 1129–1157.
Paap, K. R., Newsome, S. L., McDonald, J. E., &Schvaneveldt, R. W. (1982). An activation verification model for letter and word recognition: The word superiority effect.Psychological Review,89, 573–594.
Sears, C. R., Hino, Y., &Lupker, S. J. (1995). Neighborhood size and neighborhood frequency effects in word recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,21, 876–900.
Seidenberg, M. S., Waters, G. S., Barnes, M. A., &Tannenhaus, M. K. (1984). When does irregular spelling or pronunciation influence word recognition?Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,23, 383–404.
Smith, J. E. K. (1976). The assuming-will-make-it-so fallacy.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,15, 262–263.
Snodgrass, J. G., &Mintzer, M. (1993). Neighborhood effects in visual word recognition: Facilitatory or inhibitory?Memory & Cognition,21, 247–266.
Waters, G. S., &Seidenberg, M. S. (1985). Spelling-sound effects in reading: Time course and decision criteria.Memory & Cognition,13, 557–572.
Wike, E. L., &Church, J. D. (1976). Comments on Clark’s “The Language-as-Fixed-Effect Fallacy”.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,15, 249–255.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Portions of these data were presented at the 36th Annual Meeting of the Psychonomic Society, Los Angeles, November 1995.
—Accepted by previous editor, Myron L. Braunstein
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Sears, C.R., Lupker, S.J. & Hino, Y. Orthographic neighborhood effects in perceptual identification and semantic categorization tasks: A test of the multiple read-out model. Perception & Psychophysics 61, 1537–1554 (1999). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03213116
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03213116