Phonological neighbors speed visual word processing: evidence from multiple tasks

The author investigated the role of phonological neighborhood on visual word recognition. Using a lexical decision task, the author showed in Experiment 1 that words with large phonological neighborhoods were processed more rapidly than those with smaller phonological neighborhoods. This facilitative effect was obtained even when the nonword fillers had the same number of phonological neighbors as the words. This finding indicates that phonological neighbors speed processing within the phonological system. In the next 2 experiments, this claim was further tested using the naming and semantic categorization tasks. In both experiments, the effect of phonological neighborhood was found to be facilitative. The results across all 3 experiments indicate that phonology is central to visual word recognition and that phonological neighborhood provides a reliable measure of phonological processing.     

The effect of phonological neighborhood density on eye movements during reading

Recent research has indicated that phonological neighbors speed processing in a variety of isolated word recognition tasks. Nevertheless, as these tasks do not represent how we normally read, it is not clear if phonological neighborhood has an effect on the reading of sentences for meaning. In the research reported here, we evaluated whether phonological neighborhood density influences reading of target words embedded in sentences. The eye movement data clearly revealed that phonological neighborhood facilitated reading. This was evidenced by shorter fixations for words with large neighborhoods relative to words with small neighborhoods. These results are important in indicating that phonology is a crucial component of reading and that it affects early lexical processing.     

Speaking two languages at once: Unconscious native word form access in second language production

Bilingualism research has established language non-selective lexical access in comprehension. However, the evidence for such an effect in production remains sparse and its neural time-course has not yet been investigated. We demonstrate that German-English bilinguals performing a simple picture-naming task exclusively in English spontaneously access the phonological form of –unproduced– German words. Participants were asked to produce English adjective-noun sequences describing the colour and identity of familiar objects presented as line drawings. We associated adjective and picture names such that their onsets phonologically overlapped in English (e.g., green goat), in German through translation (e.g., blue flower – ‘blaue Blume’), or in neither language. As expected, phonological priming in English modulated event-related brain potentials over the frontocentral scalp region from around 440 ms after picture onset. Phonological priming in German was detectable even earlier, from 300 ms, even though German was never produced and in the absence of an interaction between language and phonological repetition priming at any point in time. Overall, these results establish the existence of non-selective access to phonological representations of the two languages in the domain of speech production.     

An examination of word frequency and neighborhood density in the development of spoken-word recognition

In this study, the effects of word-frequency and phonological similarity relations in the development of spoken-word recognition were examined. Seven-, 9-, and 11-year-olds and adults listened to increasingly longer segments of high- and low-frequency monosyllabic words with many or few word neighbors that sounded similar (neighborhood density). Older children and adults required less of the acoustic-phonetic information to recognize words with few neighbors and low-frequency words than did younger children. Adults recognized high-frequency words with few neighbors on the basis of less input than did all three of the children’s groups. All subjects showed a higher proportion of different-word guesses for words with many versus few neighbors. A frequency × neighborhood density interaction revealed that recognition is facilitated for high-frequency words with few versus many neighbors; the opposite was found for low-frequency words. Results are placed within a developmental framework on the emergence of the phoneme as a unit in perceptual processing.     

Semantic and phonological influences on the processing of words and pseudohomophones

In two experiments, we investigated the relationship between semantics and phonology in the lexical decision task. In the first experiment, lexical decisions to words with large semantic neighborhoods were faster than those to words with sparse semantic neighborhoods. Conversely, this effect of semantic neighborhood was reversed for pseudohomophones (e.g., nale). That is, pseudohomophones based on words with large semantic neighborhoods took longer to reject than did those based on words with sparse semantic neighborhoods. In the second experiment, we found the magnitude of the semantic neighborhood effect for words to be a function of nonword foil type. Taken together, these results indicate that semantic neighborhood size affects processing of both words and pseudohomophones, and that the effect of semantic neighborhood size for words is more pronounced when pseudohomophone foils are employed. These effects are discussed in terms of a model in which the orthographic, phonological, and semantic systems are fully interactive.     

Grammatical constraints on phonological encoding in speech production

To better understand the influence of grammatical encoding on the retrieval and encoding of phonological word-form information during speech production, we examine how grammatical class constraints influence the activation of phonological neighbors (words phonologically related to the target—e.g., MOON, TWO for target TUNE). Specifically, we compare how neighbors that share a target’s grammatical category (here, nouns) influence its planning and retrieval, assessed by picture naming latencies, and phonetic encoding, assessed by word productions in picture names, when grammatical constraints are strong (in sentence contexts) versus weak (bare naming). Within-category (noun) neighbors influenced planning time and phonetic encoding more strongly in sentence contexts. This suggests that grammatical encoding constrains phonological processing; the influence of phonological neighbors is grammatically dependent. Moreover, effects on planning times could not fully account for phonetic effects, suggesting that phonological interaction affects articulation after speech onset. These results support production theories integrating grammatical, phonological, and phonetic processes.     

Procura-PALavras (P-PAL): A Web-based interface for a new European Portuguese lexical database

In this article, we present Procura-PALavras (P-PAL), a Web-based interface for a new European Portuguese (EP) lexical database. Based on a contemporary printed corpus of over 227 million words, P-PAL provides a broad range of word attributes and statistics, including several measures of word frequency (e.g., raw counts, per-million word frequency, logarithmic Zipf scale), morpho-syntactic information (e.g., parts of speech [PoSs], grammatical gender and number, dominant PoS, and frequency and relative frequency of the dominant PoS), as well as several lexical and sublexical orthographic (e.g., number of letters; consonant–vowel orthographic structure; density and frequency of orthographic neighbors; orthographic Levenshtein distance; orthographic uniqueness point; orthographic syllabification; and trigram, bigram, and letter type and token frequencies), and phonological measures (e.g., pronunciation, number of phonemes, stress, density and frequency of phonological neighbors, transposed and phonographic neighbors, syllabification, and biphone and phone type and token frequencies) for ~53,000 lemmatized and ~208,000 nonlemmatized EP word forms. To obtain these metrics, researchers can choose between two word queries in the application: (i) analyze words previously selected for specific attributes and/or lexical and sublexical characteristics, or (ii) generate word lists that meet word requirements defined by the user in the menu of analyses. For the measures it provides and the flexibility it allows, P-PAL will be a key resource to support research in all cognitive areas that use EP verbal stimuli. P-PAL is freely available at http://p-pal.di.uminho.pt/tools.     

Tracking recognition of spoken words by tracking looks to printed words

Eye movements of Dutch participants were tracked as they looked at arrays of four words on a computer screen and followed spoken instructions (e.g., “Klik op het woord buffel”: Click on the word buffalo). The arrays included the target (e.g., buffel), a phonological competitor (e.g., buffer, buffer), and two unrelated distractors. Targets were monosyllabic or bisyllabic, and competitors mismatched targets only on either their onset or offset phoneme and only by one distinctive feature. Participants looked at competitors more than at distractors, but this effect was much stronger for offset-mismatch than onset-mismatch competitors. Fixations to competitors started to decrease as soon as phonetic evidence disfavouring those competitors could influence behaviour. These results confirm that listeners continuously update their interpretation of words as the evidence in the speech signal unfolds and hence establish the viability of the methodology of using eye movements to arrays of printed words to track spoken-word recognition.     

Orthographic neighborhood effects in perceptual identification and semantic categorization tasks: a test of the multiple read-out model

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 neighborhood 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 sigma 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.     

Stuttering, cluttering, and phonological complexity: case studies

The phonological complexity of dysfluencies in those who clutter and/or stutter may help us better understand phonetic factors in these two types of fluency disorders. In this preliminary investigation, cases were three 14-year-old males, diagnosed as a Stutterer, a Clutterer, and a Stutterer–Clutterer. Spontaneous speech samples were transcribed, coded for dysfluent words which were then matched to fluent words on grammatical class (i.e., function vs. content), number of syllables and word familiarity. An Index of Phonological Complexity was determined per word, and word frequency, density and phonological neighborhood frequency were derived from an online database. Results showed that compared to fluent words, dysfluent words were more phonologically complex and ‘sparser’, implying that they have fewer phonological neighbors or words in which a single phoneme is added, deleted or substituted. Interpretations and future directions for research regarding phonological complexity in stuttering and cluttering are offered.Educational objectives: 1. The reader can list three key symptoms of cluttering. 2. The reader will define phonological neighborhood density and neighborhood frequency. 3. The reader can calculate the Index of Phonological Complexity (IPC) for a given word. 4. The reader can state two findings from the current study and how each relates to other studies of phonological complexity and fluency disorders.     

The spread of the phonological neighborhood influences spoken word recognition

In three experiments, the processing of words that had the same overall number of neighbors but varied in the spread of the neighborhood (i.e., the number of individual phonemes that could be changed to form real words) was examined. In an auditory lexical decision task, a naming task, and a same-different task, words in which changes at only two phoneme positions formed neighbors were responded to more quickly than words in which changes at all three phoneme positions formed neighbors. Additional analyses ruled out an account based on the computationally derived uniqueness points of the words. Although previous studies (e.g., Luce & Pisoni, 1998) have shown that the number of phonological neighbors influences spoken word recognition, the present results show that the nature of the relationship of the neighbors to the target word--as measured by the spread of the neighborhood--also influences spoken word recognition. The implications of this result for models of spoken word recognition are discussed.     

The influence of phonological similarity neighborhoods on speech production

The influence of phonological similarity neighborhoods on the speed and accuracy of speech production was investigated with speech-error elicitation and picture-naming tasks. The results from 2 speech-error elicitation techniques-the spoonerisms of laboratory induced predisposition technique (B. J. Baars, 1992; B. J. Baars & M. T. Motley, 1974; M. T. Motley & B. J. Baars, 1976) and tongue twisters-showed that more errors were elicited for words with few similar sounding words (i.e., a sparse neighborhood) than for words with many similar sounding words (i.e., a dense neighborhood). The results from 3 picture-naming tasks showed that words with sparse neighborhoods were also named more slowly than words with dense neighborhoods. These findings demonstrate that multiple word forms are activated simultaneously and influence the speed and accuracy of speech production. The implications of these findings for current models of speech production are discussed.     

Books Received From August 1, 2010 to July 31, 2011

Word learning is a lifelong activity constrained by cognitive biases that people possess at particular points in development. Age of acquisition (AoA) is a psycholinguistic variable that may prove useful toward gauging the relative weighting of different phonological, semantic, and morphological factors at different phases of language acquisition and development. Our aim here was to evaluate AoA as a statistical tool for taking “snapshots” of cognitive development. We examined a large corpus of English nouns (n = 1,381) with AoA as the outcome variable in three separate multivariate regressions, encompassing different age ranges (early–middle–late). Predictors included perceptual (e.g., imagery), phonological (e.g., phonological neighborhood density), and lexical (e.g., word length) factors. Different combinations of predictors accounted for significant proportions of the variance for different AoA ranges (i.e., early–middle–late). For example, imageability and frequency are stronger predictors of early relative to late word learning. These corpus analyses support a hybrid model of word learning in which multiple perceptual and linguistic factors are differentially weighted over time. This statistical approach may provide independent corroboration of and motivation for experimental studies in language learning and cognitive development.     

The effects of spelling consistency on phonological awareness: A comparison of English and German

Within alphabetic languages, spelling-to-sound consistency can differ dramatically. For example, English and German are very similar in their phonological and orthographic structure but not in their consistency. In English the letter a is pronounced differently in the words bank, ball, and park, whereas in German the letter a always has the same pronunciation (e.g., Ball, Park, Bank). It is often argued that reading acquisition has a reciprocal effect on phonological awareness. As reading is acquired, therefore, spoken language representation may be affected differently for English and German children. Prior to literacy acquisition, however, phonological representation in English and German children should be similar due to the similar phonological structure of the two languages. We explored this hypothesis by comparing phonological awareness at the rime and phoneme levels in prereaders and beginning readers in English and German. Similar developmental effects were indeed observed in prereaders, but differential effects had emerged within the first year of reading instruction.     

Network structure influences speech production

Network science provides a new way to look at old questions in cognitive science by examining the structure of a complex system, and how that structure might influence processing. In the context of psycholinguistics, clustering coefficient-a common measure in network science-refers to the extent to which phonological neighbors of a target word are also neighbors of each other. The influence of the clustering coefficient on spoken word production was examined in a corpus of speech errors and a picture-naming task. Speech errors tended to occur in words with many interconnected neighbors (i.e., higher clustering coefficient). Also, pictures representing words with many interconnected neighbors (i.e., high clustering coefficient) were named more slowly than pictures representing words with few interconnected neighbors (i.e., low clustering coefficient). These findings suggest that the structure of the lexicon influences the process of lexical access during spoken word production.     

The Effect of the Balance of Orthographic Neighborhood Distribution in Visual Word Recognition

The present study investigated whether the balance of neighborhood distribution (i.e., the way orthographic neighbors are spread across letter positions) influences visual word recognition. Three word conditions were compared. Word neighbors were either concentrated on one letter position (e.g.,nasse/basse-lasse-tasse-masse) or were unequally spread across two letter positions (e.g.,pelle/celle-selle-telle-perle), or were equally spread across two letter positions (e.g.,litre/titre-vitre-libre-livre). Predictions based on the interactive activation model [McClelland & Rumelhart (1981). Psychological Review, 88, 375–401] were generated by running simulations and were confirmed in the lexical decision task. Data showed that words were more rapidly identified when they had spread neighbors rather than concentrated neighbors. Furthermore, within the set of spread neighbors, words were more rapidly recognized when they had equally rather than unequally spread neighbors. The findings are explained in terms of activation and inhibition processes in the interactive activation framework.     

The neighborhood distribution effect in visual word recognition: words with single and twin neighbors

Lexical-decision tasks were used to test the role of neighborhood distribution in visual word recognition. Predictions based on the interactive activation model were generated by running simulations. The data were compared for words with 2 higher frequency neighbors that differed in their neighborhood distribution. The neighbors were "single" when they did not share a neighborhood relationship (e.g., neighbors of flanc: flanc-blanc) or "twin" when they shared a neighborhood relationship (e.g., neighbors of firme: ferme-forme). Results show a facilitatory neighborhood distribution effect on words in Experiments 1 (easy pseudowords) and 3 (difficult pseudowords and easy pseudowords) and on pseudowords in Experiment 2. These data can be accounted for in terms of lexical inhibition in the interactive activation framework.     

Phonological recoding in lexical decision: Effects of spelling-to-sound regularity depend on how regularity is defined

This study is concerned with two contrasting accounts of lexieal access in reading, phonological receding and direct access. Experiment I demonstrated that exception words that have a guide to their pronunciation listed in theOxford Paperback Dictionary (e.g., GAUGE) gave rise to longer lexical decision times than matched regular words (e.g., GRILL). Experiment 2 contrasted three types of words: exceptions that have dictionary-listed pronunciations, exceptions without listed pronunciations, and regular words. Lexieal decision responses to the first type were significantly longer than those produced to the other two types. Nonlisted exception words, however, did not differ from regular words. Experiment 3 confirmed the results of Experiment 2, using pronunciation speed as the dependent measure. Experiment 4 showed that the slower lexical decision times associated with dictionary-listed exception words remain when subjects are given speeded-response instructions. In contrast to earlier studies of a similar kind, these results indicate the existence of a phonological receding stage in reading. Furthermore, they suggest that the phonological recoding system is more flexible than was previously thought.     

Orthographic neighbors and visual word recognition

Two lexical decision experiments, using words that were selected and closely matched on several criteria associated with lexical access, provide evidence of facilitatory effects of orthographic neighborhood size and no significant evidence of inhibitory effects of orthographic neighborhood frequency on lexical access. The words used in Experiment 1 had few neighbors that were higher in frequency. In Experiment 2, the words employed had several neighbors that were higher in frequency. Both experiments showed that words possessing few neighbors evoked slower responses than those possessing many neighbors. Also, in both experiments, neighborhood size effects occurred even though words from large neighborhoods had more potentially interfering higher-frequency neighbors than words from small neighborhoods.     

Phonological Activation in Multi-syllabic Sord Recognition

Three experiments were conducted to test the phonological recoding hypothesis in visual word recognition. Most studies on this issue have been conducted using mono-syllabic words, eventually constructing various models of phonological processing. Yet in many languages including English, the majority of words are multi-syllabic words. English includes words incorporating a silent letter in their letter strings (e.g., champane). Such words provide an opportunity for investigating the role of phonological information in multi-syllabic words by comparing them to words that do not have the silent letter in the corresponding position (e.g., passener). The performance focus is on the effects of removing letters from words with a silent letter and from words with a non-silent letter. Three representative lexical tasks—naming, semantic categorization, lexical decision—were conducted in the present study. Stimuli that excluded a silent letter (e.g., champa_ne) were processed faster than those that excluded a sounding letter (e.g., passen_er) in the naming (Experiment 1), the semantic categorization (Experiment 2), and the lexical decision task (Experiment 3). The convergent evidence from these three experiments provides seminal proof of phonological recoding in multi-syllabic word recognition. An erratum to this article can be found at