A reexamination of consonant–vowel differences in masked transposed letter priming effects in the lexical decision task.

Abstract

Most orthographic coding models are based on the assumption that the orthographic code does not distinguish between vowels and consonants and, therefore, those models predict no difference between vowel (cisano-CASINO) and consonant (caniso-CASINO) transposed-letter (TL) effects. The available data, however, do provide some evidence for a consonant–vowel distinction at the level of the orthographic code. Most centrally, masked priming lexical decision tasks, mainly carried out in Spanish, have shown priming from consonant TL primes (e.g., caniso) but not from vowel TL primes (e.g., cisano). The present experiments were an investigation of this pattern. Experiment 1, based on Schubert, Kinoshita, and Norris’ (2018) stimuli which showed no consonant–vowel differences in an unprimed same-different task, also showed no consonant–vowel differences in masked TL priming effects in lexical decision showing, for the first time, a vowel TL priming effect in that task. Experiment 2, using Lupker, Perea, and Davis’ (2008) Experiment 1a stimuli, also showed a small but significant vowel TL priming effect (a nonreplication of that experiment), while replicating the consonant TL priming effect that those authors originally reported. In Experiment 3, TL priming was again essentially unaffected by the consonant-vowel status of the letters involved as well as by target frequency, a variable on which the Experiment 1 and 2 stimuli differed. These results, supported by evoked response potential (ERP) results from other labs, suggest that consonant–vowel TL differences, when they do emerge in English, are likely are not due to the nature of the orthographic code.

Language Dominance Modulates Transposed-Letter N400 Priming Effects in Bilinguals

“…In adult readers, this might be expected to translate to more flexible orthographic codes for high frequency words relative to low frequency words. 3 Behavioral evidence for an interaction between frequency and the size of TL priming effects is elusive (e.g., Forster et al, 1987 ; Yang & Lupker, 2020 ). Note, however, that the interaction between language and TL priming also failed to reach significance in the language decision responses that we analyzed here.…”

Consonant and vowel transposition effects during reading development: A study on Italian children and adults

“…Thus, perhaps when comparing priming effects of different sizes (or testing whether priming effects are present), a better manipulation would be to use conditions which are known to provide the maximal probability of producing an effect. Given that VV transpositions have been shown to give small or null priming effects in some situations (Lupker et al, 2008; Perea & Lupker, 2004; but see Yang & Lupker, 2020), it would be important to test the VV transposition effect with a condition in which priming effects are maximised (i.e., with adjacent transpositions). It might be interesting, therefore, to see whether our results would be replicated if adjacent transpositions were used in Spanish.…”

“…In the following years, similar patterns have been found in other masked priming lexical decision experiments in Spanish (Acha & Perea, 2008; Comesaña et al, 2016; Perea & Acha, 2009; see also Carreiras et al, 2007, 2009; Johnson, 2007) and in English (Lupker et al, 2008). More recently, however, Yang and Lupker (2020) were unable to replicate the pattern in English (i.e., consonant and vowel transpositions produced equivalent TL priming effects), a result that led those researchers to conclude that differences between consonants and vowels typically emerge at later stages than the orthographic coding stage, the stage that is typically examined with masked priming. Nonetheless, at least in Spanish, a language that is similar to Italian in many respects, there seems to be evidence for the existence of a consonant–vowel difference in TL priming effects.…”