Abstract
Semantic priming in a lexical decision task was investigated with concurrent pretarget and posttarget primes. The posttarget prime also served as a pattern mask of the lexical decision target. Forward priming is defined as the presence of a semantically related pretarget prime and an unrelated posttarget prime. Backward priming is defined as the presence of a semantically related posttarget prime and an unrelated pretarget prime. Forward and backward priming were compared both when the nonword foils were “legal” and when they were “illegal” with respect to English orthography. Predictions were derived for two general approaches to word recognition: spreading-activation and expectancy-set theories. Both approaches assume that word representations occupy distinct, nonoverlapping locations in memory. Backward-prime facilitation was equivalent to forward-prime facilitation when nonword foils were illegal; however, backwardprime facilitation was not significant when nonword foils were legal. These results challenge both approaches. The proposed solution uses semantic-space (distributed) representations that arefunctionally unitized by a resonant matching (verification) process.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Battig, W. F., & Monxague, W. E. (1969). Category norms for verbal items in 56 categories: A replication and extension of the Connectcut category norms.Journal of Experimental Psychology Monograph,80(3, Pt. 2).
Becker.C. A. (1976). Allocation of attention during visual word recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,2, 556–566.
Becker, C A. (1979). Semantic context and word frequency effects in visual word recognitionJournal of Experimental Psychology Human Perception & Performance,5, 252–259.
Becker, C. A. (1980). Semantic context effects in visual word recognition: An analysis of semantac strategies.Memory & Cognition,8, 493–512.
Becrier, C. A., &Kellion, T. H. (1977) Interaction of visual and cognltive effects in word recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology Human Perception & Performance,3, 389–401.
Briand, K., Den Heyer, K., &Dannenbring, G. L. (1988). Retroactive semantic priming in a lexical decision task.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,40A, 341–359.
Broadbent, D. E. (1977). The hidden pre-attentive processes.Amencan Psychologist,32, 109–118.
Broadbent, D. E., &Broadbent, M. H. P. (1980). Priming and the passive/active model of word recognition. In R. Nickerson (Ed.),Attention and performance (Vol. 8, pp. 419–433). Hillsdale, NJ Erlbaum
Carpenter, G., & Grossberg, S. (1987). Neural dynamics of category learning and recognition: Attention, memory consolidation, and anmesia. In J. Davis, R. Newburgh, & E. Wegman (Eds.),Brain structure, learning, and memory. AAAS Symposium Series.
Carroll, M., &Kirsner, K (1982). Context and repetition effects in lexical decision and recognition memory.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,21, 55–69
Collins, A M., &Loftus, E. F. (1975). A spreading activation theory of semantic processing.Psychological Review,82, 407–428
Collins, A. M., &Quillian, M. R. (1969). Retrieval lame from semantic memory.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavtor,8, 240–247.
Drewnowski A., &Healy, A. F. (1977). Detection errors on the and and: Evidence for reading units larger than the word.Memory & Cognition,5, 636–647.
Fischler, I. (1977). Semantic facilitation without association in a lexcal decision task.Memory & Cognition,5, 335–339.
Fodor, J. A., &Pylyshyn, Z. W. (1988). Connectionlsm and cognition: A critical analysis.Cognition,28, 3–71.
Forster, K. I. (1976). Accessing the mental lexicon. In R. J. Wales & E. C. T. Walker (Eds.),New approaches to language mechanisms (pp. 257–287). Amsterdam: North Holland.
Grossberg, S. (1980). How does the brain build a cognitive code?Psychological Review,87, 1–51
Grossberg, S., &Stone, G. O (1986). Neural dynamics of word recognition and recall: Attentional priming, learning, and resonance.Psychological Review,93, 46–74.
Healy, A. F., Conboy, G. L., a Drewnowski, A. (1989).Characterizing the processing units of reading: Effects of intra- and interword spaces in a letter detection task. Unpublished manuscript.
Jacobson, J. Z. (1973). Effects of association upon masking and reading latency.Canadian Journal of Psychology,27, 58–69.
Jacobson, J. Z. (1974). Interaction of similarity to words, visual masks and targets.Journal of Experimental Psychology,102, 431–434.
Jacobson, J. Z., &Rhinelander, G. (1978). Geometric and semantic similarity in visual masking.Journal of Experimental Psychology. Human Perception & Performance,4, 224–231.
James C. (1975). The role of semantic information in lexical decisions.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,1, 130–136.
Kiger, J. I., &Glass, A. L. (1983). The facilitation of lexical decisions by a prime occurring after the target.Memory & Cognition,11, 356–365.
Kučera, H., &Francis, W. (1967).Computational analysis ofpresentday American English. Providence, RI: Brown University Press.
McClelland, J. L. (1978). Perception and masking of wholes and parts.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,4, 210–223.
McKoon, M., &Santee, J. (1981). Are semantic memory and episodic memory distmct systems?Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning & Memory,7, 66–71.
Mckoon, G., &Ratcliff, R. (1980). Priming in item recognition: The organization of propositions in memory for text.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,19, 369–386.
Morris, W. (Ed.) (1969).The American heritage dtctionary of the English language. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Morton, J. (1969). Interaction of information in word recognition.Psychological Review,76, 165–178.
Neely, J. H., &Durgunoglu, A. Y. (1985). Dissociative episodic and semantic priming effects in episodic recognition and lexical decision tasks.Journal of Memory & Language,24, 466–489.
Paap, K. R., Newsome, S. L., McDonald, J. E., &Schvaneveldt, R. W. (1982). An activation-verification model for letter and word recognition: The word superiority effect.Psychological Review,89, 573–594.
Palermo, D. S., &Jenkins, J. J. (1964).Word association norms: Grade school through college. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Parcliff, R., &Mckoon, G. (1981). Does activation really spread?Psychological Review,88, 454–462.
Rosch, E. (1978). Principles of categorization. In E. Rosch & B. Lloyd (Eds.),Categorization and cognition (pp. 27–48). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Rumelhart, D. E., Hinton, G. E, &Williams, R. J. (1986) Learning internal representations by error propagation In D. E. Rumelhart, J. L. McClelland, & the PDP group,Parallel distributed processlng: Explorations in the microstructure of cognition (Vol. 1, pp. 318–362). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Schvaneveldt, R. W., &Mcdonald, J. E. (1981). Semantic context and the encoding of words: Evidence for two modes of stimulus analysisJournal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,7, 673–687
Seidenberg, M. S., Waters, G. S., Sanders, M., &Langer, P. (1984). Pre- and postlexical loci of contextual effects on word recognition.Memory &Cognition,12, 315–328.
Shoben, E. J., Wescourx, K. T., &Smith, E. E. (1978). Sentence verification, sentence recognition, and the semantic-episodic distinction.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning & Memory,4, 304–317.
Shulman, H. G., &Davison, T. C. B. (1977). Control properties of semantic coding in a lexical decision task.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,16, 91–98.
Shulman, H. G., Hornak, R., &Sanders, E. (1978). The effects of graphemic, phonetic, and semantic relationships on access to lexical structures.Memory & Cognition,6, 115–123.
Smith, E. E., Haviland, S. E., Reder, L. M., Brownell, H., &Adams, N. (1976). When preparation fads: Disruptive effects of prior reformation on perceptual recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Percepnon & Performance,2, 151–161.
Smuts, E. E., Shosen, E. J, &Rips, L. J. (1974). Structure and process in semantic memory: A featural model of semantic decisions.Psychologtcal Review,81, 214–241.
Smolensky, P. (1988). On the proper treatment of connectionlsm.Behavtoral & Brain Sctences,11, 1–74.
Sperling, G. (1960). The information available in brief visual presentations.Psychologtcal Monographs,74, 1–29.
Stone, G. O. (1985).Semantic facilitation by a word mask: Implications for theories of word recognition and interruption masking. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of California, San Diego.
Stone, G. O. (1986, August).A distributed model of semantic priming. Paper presented at the 19th Annual Meetang of the Mathematical Psychology Society, Boston, MA.
Stone, G. O. (1988). From data to dynamics: The use of mulluple levels of analysis.Behavioral & Brain Sciences,11, 54–55.
Stroop, J. R. (1935). Studies of interference in serial verbal reactions.Journal of Experimental Psychology,18, 643–662.
Taylor, G. A., &Chabot, R. I. (1978). Differential backward masking of words and letters by masks of varying orthographic structure.Memory & Cognition,6, 629–635.
Turvey, M. T (1973). On peripheral and central processes in vision. Inferences from an information-processing analysis of masking with patterned stimuli.Psychological Review,80, 1–52.
Tweedy, J. R., Lapinski, R. H., &Schvaneveldt, R. W. (1977). Semantic-context effects on word recognition: Influence of varying the proportion of items presented in an appropriate context.Memory & Cognition,5, 84–89.
Van Orden, G. C. (1987). A ROWS is a ROSE: Spelling, sound, and reading.Memory & Cognition,15, 181–198.
Van Orders, G. C. (in press). Phonologic mediation is fundamental to reading. In D. Besner & G. Humphreys (Eds.),Basic processes in reading: Visual word recognition. Hillsdale, N J: Erlbaum.
Van Orden, G. C., Pennington, B., & Stone, G. O. (1989).Word identification in reading and the promise of subsymbolic psycholinguistics. Manuscript submitted for publication.
Wickelgren, W. (1976). Network strength theory of storage and retrieval dynamics.Psychological Review,83, 466–478.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
This research partially fulfdled the requirements for a doctoral degree for Greg Stone at the University of California, San Diego. His work on this research was supported in part by an intramural grant from the University of California, San Diego to Jeffrey Miller and a grant from the Office of Naval Research (ONR N00014-83-K0337) to Stephen Grossberg.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Stone, G.O., Van Orden, G.C. Are words represented by nodes?. Memory & Cognition 17, 511–524 (1989). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03197073
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03197073