Abstract
The time to name a nonword increases monotonically as letter length increases. The leading computational model of basic processes in reading (Coltheart, Rastle, Perry, Langdon & Ziegler’sdual route cascaded model) simulates this, because its nonlexical route assigns phonemes to letters serially, left to right, and arguably, this corresponds to what humans do. New simulation work shows that (1) this letter length effect interacts with the effect of slowing the rate of early processing, and (2) the model produces a qualitatively different pattern from that observed with university-level readers. The contrast between simulation and human performance thus illuminates a problem with how the nonlexical route operates in the model, and constrains accounts that can be provided for the human data. Consideration is given to thresholding the output of the letter-level module as a way to modify the model so as to make it possible to simulate the human data.
Article PDF
References
Balota, D., &Abrams, D. (1995).Mental chronometry: Beyond onset latencies in the lexical decision task.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,21, 1289–1302.
Becker, C. A., &Killion, T. H. (1977). Interaction of visual and cognitive effects in word recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,3, 389–401. or]Besner, D., Reynolds, M., & Chang, K. (2002). Basic processes in reading: Evolution of the dual route cascaded model. (Manuscript under revision)
Besner, D., &Smith, M. (1992). Models of visual word recognition: When obscuring the stimulus yields a clearer view.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,18, 468–482.
Besner, D., &Swan, M. (1982). Models of lexical access in visual word recognition.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,34A, 313–325.
Borowsky, R., &Besner, D. (1993). Visual word recognition: A multistage activation model.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 19, 813–840.
Coltheart, M., Rastle, K., Perry, C., Langdon, R., &Ziegler, J. (2001). DRC: A dual route cascaded model of visual word recognition and reading aloud.Psychological Review,108, 204–256.
Grainger, J., &Jacobs, A. M. (1996). Orthographic processing in visual word recognition: A multiple read-out model.Psychological Review,103, 518–565.
McClelland, J. L., &Rumelhart, D. E. (1981). An interactive activation model of context effects in letter perception: Part 1. An account of basic findings.Psychological Review,88, 375–407.
Meyer, D. E., Schvaneveldt, R. W., &Ruddy, M. G. (1975). Loci of contextual effects on visual word recognition. In P. M. A. Rabbitt & S. Dornic (Eds.)Attention and Performance V (pp. 98–118). San Diego: Academic Press.
Pashler, H. (1994). Dual-task interference in simple tasks: Data and theory.Psychological Bulletin,116, 220–244.
Pashler, H., &Johnston, J. (1989). Chronometric evidence for central postponement in temporally overlapping tasks.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,41A, 19–45.
Plaut, D. C., &Booth, J. R. (2000). Individual and developmental differences in semantic priming: Empirical and computational support for a single-mechanism account of lexical processing.Psychological Review,107, 786–823.
Plourde, C., &Besner, D. (1997). On the locus of the word frequency effect in visual word recognition.Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology,51, 181–194.
Rastle, K., &Coltheart, M. (1998). Whammies and double whammies: The effect of length on nonword reading.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,5, 277–282.
Rastle, K., &Coltheart, M. (1999). Serial and strategic effects in reading aloud.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,25, 482–503.
Rastle, K., Harrington, J., Coltheart, M., &Palethorpe, S. (2000). Reading aloud begins when the computation of phonology is complete.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,26, 1178–1191.
Roberts, M. A., Rastle, K., Coltheart, M., & Besner, D. (2003). When parallel processing in visual word recognition is not enough: New evidence from naming.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 405–414.
Schneider, W. (1988). Micro Experimental Laboratory: An integrated system for IBM PC compatibles.Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers,20, 206–217.
Stanners, R. F., Jastrzembski, J. E., &Westbrook, A. (1975). Frequency and visual quality in a word-nonword classif ication task.Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior,14, 259–264.
Sternberg, S. (1969). The discovery of processing stages: Extensions of Donders’ method.Acta Psychologica,30, 276–315.
Sternberg, S. (1998). Discovering mental processing stages: The method of additive factors. In D. Scarborough & S. Sternberg (Eds.),An invitation to cognitive science: Vol. 4. Methods, models, and conceptual issues (pp. 703–863). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Stolz, J. A., &Neely, J. (1995). When target degradation does and does not enhance semantic context effects in word recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,21, 596–611.
Van Selst, M., &Jolicoeur, P. (1994). A solution to the effect of sample size on outlier elimination.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,47A, 631–650.
Weekes, B. S. (1997). Differential effects of number of letters on word and nonword naming latency.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,50A, 439–456.
Ziegler, J. C., Perry, C., Jacobs, A. M., &Braun, M. (2001). Identical words are read differently in different languages.Psychological Science,12, 379–384.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
This work was supported by Grant A0998 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to D.B.
Electronic supplementary material
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Besner, D., Roberts, M.A. Reading nonwords aloud: Results requiring change in the dual route cascaded model. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 10, 398–404 (2003). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03196498
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03196498