Age of acquisition effects in picture naming: evidence for a lexical-semantic competition hypothesis

Abstract

In many tasks the effects of frequency and age of acquisition (AoA) on reaction latencies are similar in size. However, in picture naming the AoA-effect is often significantly larger than expected on the basis of the frequency-effect. Previous explanations of this frequency-independent AoA-effect have attributed it to the organisation of the semantic system or to the way phonological word forms are stored in the mental lexicon. Using a semantic blocking paradigm, we show that semantic context effects on naming latencies are more pronounced for late-acquired than for early-acquired words. This interaction between AoA and naming context is likely to arise during lexical-semantic encoding, which we put forward as the locus for the frequency-independent AoA-effect. q 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.Keywords: Age-of-acquisition; Picture naming; Lexical retrieval; Semantic context Word processing times depend not only on the frequency with which the words occur in texts, but also on the age at which they were acquired (age-of-acquisition, AoA). Words that were acquired early in life are responded to faster than late-acquired words of the same frequency (Morrison & Ellis, 1995). In word naming and lexical decision, the effects 0022-2860/$ -see front matter q

Comparing Electrophysiological Correlates of Word Production in Immediate and Delayed Naming Through the Analysis of Word Age of Acquisition Effects

“…The modulation of amplitudes observed between 220 and 250 ms, falls within the time-window estimated for lexical-semantic encoding process (Indefrey and Level, 2004); it therefore seems to support the hypothesis of a lexical-semantic locus of AoA effect (e.g., Belke et al, 2005;Johnston & Barry, 2005). However, further differences in amplitudes between early-and late-acquired words also appeared in a timewindow corresponding to lexical-phonological encoding (330-350 ms after picture onset and around 280 ms before RT).…”

“…This 6 hypothesis is based on the fact that AoA effects were observed neither in lexical-semantic tasks (Chalard & Bonin, 2006;Morrison et al, 1992) nor in delayed production tasks (Morrison & Ellis, 1995), therefore excluding lexical-semantic encoding levels or motor processes. However, AoA effects have been recently reported with semantic tasks (Belke, Brysbaert, Meyer, & Ghyselinck, 2005;Johnson & Barry, 2005), supporting the alternative hypothesis of a lexical-semantic locus of AoA effects.…”

“…As explained in the Introduction, two possible loci of AoA effects in picture naming have been suggested: lexical-semantic (Belke et al, 2005;Johnson & Barry, 2005) and lexical phonological encoding processes (Chalard & Bonin, 2006;Morrison and Ellis, 1995;Morrison et al, 1992). Different amplitudes between early-and late-acquired words were observed in four distinct time periods.…”

Event-Related Brain Potentials During Picture Naming, Using Early and Late Acquired Words

“…He reported that the effect of AoA was greater in naming pictures than words, and the effect of semantic context in naming early-acquired words was more substantial than in lateacquired ones. This effect was not found in word reading, since word reading does not involve Lemma stage (7). In addition, Morrison investigated the hypothesis of the AoA effect semantic locus by picture categorization task and reported no effect of AoA (10).…”

“…Some studies reported that Early Acquired Words (EAW) were named faster than Late Acquired Words (LAW), and the words acquired earlier in life are more reversible after a brain injury (5,6). In many tasks the effects of frequency and AoA on reaction latencies are equal, but in picture naming the effect of AoA is greater than frequency (7). As far as the locus of AoA effects in picture naming is concerned, the phonological retrieval stage is the one proposed most frequently.…”