Processing time for naming and categorization of letters and numbers

A reaction-time experiment was carried out to examine the relationship between naming and categorization. Ss were shown one item at a time and asked either to name the item or to categorize the item as a letter or number. The size of the stimulus set was varied systematically across Ss. Naming time increased as the stimulus set size increased; categorization time could be predicted by the time required for naming, plus a constant. These results were interpreted as indicating that naming must precede categorization.