Nature and facts about natural and artifactual categories: Sex differences in the semantic priming paradigm

There is abundant evidence from behavioral and neurophysiological experiments for the distinction of natural versus artifactual categories and a gender-specific difference: women’s performances in cognitive tasks increase when natural categories are used, whereas men’s performances increase with artifactual categories. Here, we used the semantic priming paradigm to study retrieval processes by presenting category labels as primes and exemplars as targets. Overall, in two experiments we found larger priming effects for natural than for artifactual categories. In addition, females showed positive priming effects for natural but negative effects for artifactual categories, whereas males showed positive priming effects for both categories. This pattern matches with that from other tasks and can be interpreted as evidence that the findings from these other tasks are, at least partially, indeed due to different representations or processing modes for males and females and not (exclusively) due to—for example—different familiarity with a category. In a further experiment, we showed that the found pattern for females can be manipulated by focusing on perceptual vs. functional features. The results can be interpreted as first evidence that there are (eventually in addition to different “crystallized” semantic structures) specific default processing modes that differ for males and females.     

Perceptual and semantic sources of category-specific effects: event-related potentials during picture and word categorization

In two experiments the effect of object category on event-related potentials (ERPs) was assessed while subjects performed superordinate categorizations with pictures and words referring to objects from natural (e.g., animal) and artifactual (e.g., tool) categories. First, a category probe was shown that was presented as name in Experiment 1 and as picture in Experiment 2. Thereafter, the target stimulus was displayed. In both experiments, analyses of the ERPs to the targets revealed effects of category at about 160 msec after target onset in the pictorial modality, which can be attributed to category-specific differences in perceptual processing. Later, between about 300-500 msec, natural and artifactual categories elicited similar ERP effects across target and category modalities. These findings suggest that perceptual as well as semantic sources contribute to category-specific effects. They support the view that semantic knowledge associated with different categories is represented in multiple subsystems that are similarly accessed by pictures and words.     

Perceptual and conceptual priming in a semantic reprocessing task

Two experiments are reported that addressed the relative involvement and nature of perceptual and conceptual priming in a semantically complex task. Both experiments investigated facilitation from repeated semantic comparison trials in which subjects decided whether two words had the same meaning (e.g.,moist damp). The first experiment compared the magnitude and persistence of perceptual and conceptual priming components. Perceptual priming effects were modest, and contrary to some previous evidence, they did not appear to be more persistent than nonperceptual priming effects. The second experiment investigated the memory processes involved when perceptual priming was eliminated through a modality change between prime and target trials. Evidence suggested that conceptual priming primarily involved memory for the meaning comparison processes rather than better access to existing memory for the stimulus words.     

Lexical but not semantic priming in Alzheimer's disease.

The hypothesis that patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) have a disturbance in semantic processing was tested using a new lexical-priming task, threshold oral reading. Healthy elderly controls showed significant effects of priming for word pairs that are associatively related (words that reliably co-occur in word association tests) and for word pairs that are semantically related (high-frequency exemplars that belong to the same superordinate category but are not high-frequency associates). AD patients showed effects of priming for associatively related words but not for word pairs that are related only by shared semantic features. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that semantic processing is impaired in AD and suggest that independent networks of relationships among words and among concepts in semantic memory may be differentially disrupted with various forms of brain damage.     

Controlling the unconscious: attentional task sets modulate subliminal semantic and visuomotor processes differentially

Are unconscious processes susceptible to attentional influences? In two subliminal priming experiments, we investigated whether task sets differentially modulate the sensitivity of unconscious processing pathways. We developed a novel procedure for masked semantic priming of words (Experiment 1) and masked visuomotor priming of geometrical shapes (Experiment 2). Before presentation of the masked prime, participants performed an induction task in which they attended to either semantic or perceptual object features designed to activate a semantic or perceptual task set, respectively. Behavioral and electrophysiological effects showed that the induction tasks differentially modulated subliminal priming: Semantic priming, which involves access to conceptual meaning, was found after the semantic induction task but not after the perceptual induction task. Visuomotor priming was observed after the perceptual induction task but not after the semantic induction task. These results demonstrate that unconscious cognition is influenced by attentional control. Unconscious processes in perceptual and semantic processing streams are coordinated congruently with higher-level action goals.     

An investigation of time course of category and semantic priming

Low semantically similar exemplars in a category demonstrate the category-priming effect through priming of the category (i.e., exemplar-category-exemplar), whereas high semantically similar exemplars in the same category demonstrate the semantic-priming effect (i.e., direct activation of one high semantically similar exemplar by another). The author asked whether the category- and semantic-priming effects are based on a common memory process. She examined this question by testing the time courses of category- and semantic-priming effects. She tested participants on either category- or semantic-priming paradigm at 2 different time intervals (6 min and 42 min) by using a lexical decision task using exemplars from categories. Results showed that the time course of category priming was different from that of semantic priming. The author concludes that these 2 priming effects are based on 2 separate memory processes.     

Developmental changes in the internal structure of semantic categories

The present experiment was designed to examine the development of the cognitive representation of semantic categories. Response latencies on a classification task were compared for second, fourth, and sixth graders (8, 10, and 12 years of age, respectively) and college students. On each trial the subjects were presented with two pictures that represented either typical or atypical category exemplars. The two pictures were physically identical, nonidentical pictures from the same category, or pictures from different categories. One half of the trials were primed by presenting a category name in advance of the stimuli. In addition, stimulus degradation was manipulated in order to assess the locus of priming effects. A significant interaction of age × priming × typicality was found for physically identical stimuli. This interaction indicated that the nature of the internal representation of categories changed from the second graders to the adults. It was suggested that the second graders might weigh features inappropriately in generating semantic prototypes. The fact that stimulus degradation and priming did not interact at any age level for any of the match types indicates that priming affected a conceptual encoding stage rather than a perceptual encoding stage.     

Effects of the degree of meaning similarity on cross-language semantic priming in highly proficient bilinguals

This study aimed to determine if access to meaning can be directly achieved from the words in the two languages, examining the influence of the degree of semantic overlap between related words across languages in the pattern of priming effects. Nonassociative semantically related words (members of the same category) were used, avoiding explicitly associative relationships. Using a priming paradigm, highly proficient Catalan–Spanish bilinguals were visually presented with pairs of words that either were translations of each other, had a very close semantic relationship (in terms of shared features), a close semantic relationship, or no semantic relationship at all. Participants performed either a lexical decision task (Experiment 1) or a semantic decision task (Experiment 2). The main results of the study were the same in both language directions (Spanish–Catalan and Catalan–Spanish), showing that the degree of semantic overlap (in terms of shared features) between words in different languages can modulate priming effects, regardless of the language of the prime and the task used. These results demonstrate that there is cross-language activation of shared semantic representations and, thus, that highly proficient bilinguals can have direct access to word meaning from the two languages.     

Semantic distance and single cue use in category search

Perceptual classification may be based either on the physical features of target and background items or on the semantic attributes of the presented items. In this paper we used enumeration tasks to study the role of semantic features in a categorial classification task. This means that subjects were asked to count the number of target words in a display belonging to one semantic category among a number of background items of other categories. Our goal was to study the decision logic in category search by manipulating target background conditions and the semantic distance between target and background classes. In the first experiment we found that the larger the semantic distance between targets and background words, the easier it was to find the targets. In the second experiment we found a "pop-out" effect, in which subjects could use and benefit from a single distinctive semantic feature, "part-likeness", in categorial classification. The results of the two experiments imply that the categorization decision logic is basically the same in physical and semantic perceptual classification.     

阈下知觉的加工水平及其发生条件—— 基于视觉掩蔽启动范式的视角

Dehaene等(1998)和Greenwald等(1996)的研究通过在方法上的完善, 为阈下知觉的存在提供了确凿的证据。但是阈下知觉可以达到什么样的深度这一问题尚仍然存在争议, 有研究者认为阈下知觉可以达到语义加工的水平, 而有的研究者认为阈下知觉只是对刺激视觉特征的一种浅层加工, 并形成了一些非语义加工的假说。在以往研究的基础上, 本研究通过完善实验范式, 分别采用图片、字词作为实验材料对阈下知觉的深度和影响因素进行探讨。实验1和实验2立据于阈下非语义加工的各种理论, 为阈下语义加工的存在提供了证据。同时实验2表明, 阈下知觉达到的水平取决于靶子集的大小, 更确切的说取决于被试对靶刺激进行了何种水平的加工。     

Negative priming is not task bound: A consistent pattern across naming and categorization tasks

When a word that was a to-be-ignored flanker on an initial prime trial becomes the target on the subsequent probe trial, responding to that word on the probe trial is slowed, a phenomenon callednegative priming. Virtually all prior studies have required subjects to perform the same task on both the prime and the probe trials. Thus, the extent to which negative priming is task bound is uncertain. We manipulated task factorially on the prime and probe trials, resulting in four groups: name-name, name-categorize, categorize-name, and categorize-categorize. The results showed equivalent negative priming of about 22 msec both within and between tasks for identical words, but no negative priming for semantically related words from the same category. These findings suggest (1) that negative priming for identical words can readily cross task types; and (2) that semantic negative priming does not occur for words, at least when categorical relatedness alone determines the semantic relation.     

Priming effects under correct change detection and change blindness

In three experiments, we investigated the priming effects induced by an image change on a successive animate/inanimate decision task. We studied both perceptual (Experiments 1 and 2) and conceptual (Experiment 3) priming effects, under correct change detection and change blindness (CB). Under correct change detection, we found larger positive priming effects on congruent trials for probes representing animate entities than for probes representing artifactual objects. Under CB, we found performance impairment relative to a “no-change” baseline condition. This inhibition effect induced by CB was modulated by the semantic congruency between the changed item and the probe in the case of probe images, but not for probe words. We discuss our results in the context of the literature on the negative priming effect.     

Two routes for activation in the priming of categorical coordinates

The authors operationalized category priming as participants' recognition facilitation of nonstudied, low semantically similar exemplars by studied exemplars in a category. The existing literature either does not examine the effect of studied exemplars on nonstudied exemplars in a category or fails to show an appreciable amount of category priming. In 2 experiments, the authors demonstrated a unique process to account for the category priming effect and distinguish it from the semantic priming effect, facilitation of semantically similar exemplars, in the context of a category. In Experiment 1A, the authors used a multidimensional scaling technique to examine participants' internal structure of different categories. In Experiment 1B, the authors used a lexical decision task that used these internal structures to show that semantic encoding of category exemplars causes activation of existing category knowledge in memory. Consequently, participants easily recognized nonstudied, low semantically similar exemplars in a category. However, recognition facilitation between high semantically similar exemplars did not require category knowledge activation.     

维-汉-英三语者三种语言语义通达模型的实验研究

以维吾尔族大学生为研究对象,采用跨语言启动条件下的真假词汇判断任务,变换启动词与目标词的关系类型和语言种类,考察了L2—L1、L3—L1、L3—L2等三种语言词汇之间的语义通达模式。结果发现,维-汉-英三语者的三种语言词汇之间的联结模式为熟练的第二语言词汇是直接通达语义;而非熟练的第三语言词汇既借助母语词汇又借助汉语词汇来通达语义。除此之外,被试的外语熟练水平和语言间的相似性是影响外语词汇通达语义的主要原因。     

The Micro-Category account of analogy

Here, we investigate how activation of mental representations of categories during analogical reasoning influences subsequent cognitive processing. Specifically, we present and test the central predictions of the "Micro-Category" account of analogy. This account emphasizes the role of categories in aligning terms for analogical mapping. In a semantic priming paradigm, a four-word analogy task was compared to two other four-word tasks. Stimuli were identical in all tasks; only the instructions given to participants differed. Participants were instructed to identify analogy relations, category relations, or conventionalized semantic relations in the four-word sets. After each four-word set, a single target word appeared and participants named this word aloud. Target words that referred to category relations in the preceding four-word sets were primed as strongly when participants identified analogies as when participants identified categories, suggesting that activation of category concepts plays an important role in analogical thinking. In addition, priming of category-referent words in the analogy and category tasks was significantly greater than priming of these words when participants identified conventionalized semantic relations. Since identical stimuli were used in all conditions, this finding indicates that it is the activation of category relations, distinct from any effect of basic semantic association, that causes analogical reasoning to prime category-referent words. We delineate how the "Micro-Category" account of analogy predicts these phenomena and unifies findings from diverse areas of research concerning analogical reasoning.     

Semantic distance effects on object and action naming

Graded interference effects were tested in a naming task, in parallel for objects and actions. Participants named either object or action pictures presented in the context of other pictures (blocks) that were either semantically very similar, or somewhat semantically similar or semantically dissimilar. We found that naming latencies for both object and action words were modulated by the semantic similarity between the exemplars in each block, providing evidence in both domains of graded semantic effects.     

Levels and speed of processing effects on word analysis

Previous work on semantic priming effects has suggested that priming is contingent upon semantic analysis of the prime stimulus. In the present series of experiments, subjects in Grade 3, Grade 6, and college performed variants of a priming task in which semantic (lexical decision) as well as fast (case judgment) and slow (letter search) nonsemantic levels of processing were required for both prime and target stimuli. Contrary to a levels of processing hypothesis, context effects were not simple functions of the level at which the prime was processed. Priming effects were found with a slow nonsemantic prime task (letter search), but generally not with a fast nonsemantic analysis of the prime (case judgment). The form of the priming effect when the prime was processed semantically by a lexical decision depended on the relationship between prime and target processing: a switch from semantic prime processing to nonsemantic target processing produced Stroop-like interference, with other combinations of prime and target processing producing facilitation. By using a series of discrimination, focusing, and classification tasks in a Garner (1978) paradigm, it was possible to determine how subjects were processing the semantic and nonsemantic dimensions, and these perceptual strategies were compared across educational levels to account for the priming effects. Our results suggest that context effects need to be understood in terms of the speeds of processing of different codes of information inherent in words.     

Semantic priming of different affective categories

The authors investigated affective semantic priming using a lexical decision task with 4 affective categories of related word pairs: neutral, happy, fearful, and sad. Results demonstrated a striking and reliable effect of affective category on semantic priming. Neutral and happy prime-targets yielded significant semantic priming. Fearful pairs showed no or modest priming facilitation, and sad primes slowed reactions to sad targets. A further experiment established that affective primes do not have generalized facilitatory-inhibitory effects. The results are interpreted as showing that the associative mechanisms that support semantic priming for neutral words are also shared by happy valence words but not for negative valence words. This may reflect increased vigilance necessary in adverse contexts or suggest that the associative mechanisms that bind negative valence words are distinct.     

Effects of cross-modal and intramodal division of attention on perceptual implicit memory

Extant results motivate 3 hypotheses on the role of attention in perceptual implicit memory. The first proposes that only intramodal manipulations of attention reduce perceptual priming. The second attributes reduced priming to the effects of distractor selection operating in a central bottleneck process. The third proposes that manipulations of attention only affect priming via disrupted stimulus identification. In Experiment 1, a standard cross-modal manipulation did not disrupt priming in perceptual identification. However, when study words and distractors were presented synchronously, cross-modal and intramodal distraction reduced priming. Increasing response frequency in the distractor task produced effects of attention regardless of target-distractor synchrony. These effects generalized to a different category of distractors arguing against domain-specific interference. The results support the distractor-selection hypothesis.