Phonologically-based priming in the same-different task with L1 readers.

Abstract

The present experiment provides an investigation of a promising new tool, the masked priming same-different task, for investigating the orthographic coding process. Orthographic coding is the process of establishing a mental representation of the letters and letter order in the word being read which is then used by readers to access higher-level (e.g., semantic) information about that word. Prior research (e.g., Norris & Kinoshita, 2008) had suggested that performance in this task may be based entirely on orthographic codes. As reported by Lupker, Nakayama, and Perea (2015a), however, in at least some circumstances, phonological codes also play a role. Specifically, even though their 2 languages are completely different orthographically, Lupker et al.'s Japanese-English bilinguals showed priming in this task when masked L1 primes were phonologically similar to L2 targets. An obvious follow-up question is whether Lupker et al.'s effect might have resulted from a strategy that was adopted by their bilinguals to aid in processing of, and memory for, the somewhat unfamiliar L2 targets. In the present experiment, Japanese readers responded to (Japanese) Kanji targets with phonologically identical primes (on "related" trials) being presented in a completely different but highly familiar Japanese script, Hiragana. Once again, significant priming effects were observed, indicating that, although performance in the masked priming same-different task may be mainly based on orthographic codes, phonological codes can play a role even when the stimuli being matched are familiar words from a reader's L1. (PsycINFO Database Record

Phonological priming effects with same-script primes and targets in the masked priming same-different task

“…The results of both Experiment 1 (with Japanese readers and Kanji stimuli) and Experiment 2 (with Chinese readers) indicate that the clear answer is "yes." These results coupled with those of Lupker et al (2015Lupker et al ( , 2018, who used cross-script primes and targets, solidifies the argument that phonological similarity does produce priming and, hence, that phonological information does play a role, in the SDT. The fact that phonological priming effects have now been observed in the situation in which the prime and (word) target are written in the same script has obvious implications for SDT experiments in alphabetic languages.…”

“…As there is no orthographic overlap between Japanese Katakana and English, the priming effect observed by Lupker et al (2015) is most likely phonologically based. In a follow-up, Lupker et al (2018) were able to show a similar effect using different script, but within language, primes and targets. That is, Lupker et al (2018) showed priming effects using Kanji reference stimuli and targets with Hiragana transcription primes (e.g., reference stimulus: 記号, prime: きごう, target: 記号).…”

“…In a follow-up, Lupker et al (2018) were able to show a similar effect using different script, but within language, primes and targets. That is, Lupker et al (2018) showed priming effects using Kanji reference stimuli and targets with Hiragana transcription primes (e.g., reference stimulus: 記号, prime: きごう, target: 記号). These results provide additional support for the claim that even though the priming in the masked priming SDT has a considerable orthographic component, phonology does play a role even when the stimuli are familiar words from a reader's first language.…”

“…The bottom line, therefore, is that if one is going to be able to determine whether there is also a phonological component in the SDT, one needs to create a somewhat stronger manipulation of phonology. Because the problem of creating a reasonably strong manipulation of phonology independent of the effects of orthography is difficult, if not impossible, to overcome in alphabetic languages, Lupker and colleagues (Lupker et al, 2015;Lupker, Nakayama, & Yoshihara, 2018) took a different approach, examining cross-script priming effects in the SDT and, in doing so, demonstrated clear phonological priming effects.…”

“…That is, priming effects with same script primes and (word) targets are, instead, purely orthographically based. Kinoshita et al (2018) also suggested that the reason that evidence of phonological priming had been observed when the primes and targets are in different scripts (i.e., when the primes do not share orthography with the targets, e.g., Lupker et al, 2015Lupker et al, , 2018 is because there is no orthographic competition between the prime and target letter identities in that situation, allowing phonology to have an impact. They then extended this argument to explain the phonological priming effect for (same-script) nonword targets in their Experiment 2.…”