Smith M C, Meiran N, Besner D
Life Sciences Division, University of Toronto, Scarborough, ON, Canada.
Mem Cognit. 2000 Mar;28(2):204-13. doi: 10.3758/bf03213800.
Use of the letter search task in the context of the priming paradigm has proved to be an invaluable tool for the investigation of the strategic control of processes involved in word recognition. In particular, previous findings that letter search on a prime word interferes with the priming of semantically/associatively related targets, but not with the priming of either identical or morphologically related targets, suggests that letter search may selectively interfere with semantic processing, leaving other levels of processing intact. In the present experiments, this investigation was extended by exploring the priming of pictures following letter search of either a same-concept word (repetition priming) or a semantically/associatively related word (semantic priming). There was significant repetition priming of picture categorization following both silent reading and letter search of the prime word (Experiments 1 and 2). In contrast, semantic priming of pictures was found only following silent reading of the prime; there was no semantic priming following letter search of the prime (Experiment 2). This pattern of results suggests that focusing attention at the letter level during prime processing selectively attenuates activation of the semantic system by the prime. It does not prevent the spread of activation between the lexical and pictogen levels of representation of a given concept.
在启动范式的背景下使用字母搜索任务已被证明是研究单词识别过程中策略控制的一种非常有价值的工具。特别是，先前的研究结果表明，对启动词进行字母搜索会干扰语义/联想相关目标的启动，但不会干扰相同或形态相关目标的启动，这表明字母搜索可能会选择性地干扰语义处理，而使其他处理水平保持完整。在本实验中，通过探索对同一概念词（重复启动）或语义/联想相关词（语义启动）进行字母搜索后图片的启动，扩展了这一研究。在默读和对启动词进行字母搜索后，图片分类都存在显著的重复启动（实验1和实验2）。相比之下，仅在默读启动词后发现了图片的语义启动；对启动词进行字母搜索后没有语义启动（实验2）。这种结果模式表明，在启动处理过程中将注意力集中在字母水平会选择性地减弱启动词对语义系统的激活。它不会阻止给定概念在词汇和图像表征水平之间的激活传播。
