Green D W, Liow S J, Tng S K, Zielinski S
Department of Psychology, University College London, UK.
Br J Psychol. 1996 May;87 ( Pt 2):311-26. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1996.tb02592.x.
Letters are processed differently from other shapes in a visual search task where subjects have to decide whether or not a predesignated target symbol is present in a subsequently presented string of five such symbols. If the M-shaped letter search function, which relates correct reaction time to target position, reflects an efficient strategy used in word recognition, it should be produced by skilled readers of English who also read a logographic script. A cross-linguistic study of biscriptal Mandarin/English and monoscriptal English readers (Expt 1) provided evidence of the generality of a basic search strategy for alphabetic targets. Hand-of-response affected the search function in an asymmetric fashion for both groups of readers, and although case differences between target and string increased reaction times overall, the classic M-shaped function remained. In Expt 2, we used a within-subjects design and examined the extent to which biscriptal Mandarin/English readers produced different search functions for letters and logographs. Consistent with expectation, these readers showed an M-shaped function for letters but a more U-shaped function for logographs. Hand-of-response exerted a consistent effect for both types of material. Taken together, these experiments support the view that skilled readers develop script-specific procedures.
在一项视觉搜索任务中，字母的处理方式与其他形状不同。在该任务中，受试者必须判断在随后呈现的由五个此类符号组成的字符串中是否存在预先指定的目标符号。如果将正确反应时间与目标位置相关联的M形字母搜索函数反映了单词识别中使用的有效策略，那么它应该由同时阅读表意文字脚本的熟练英语读者产生。一项针对双语普通话/英语读者和单语英语读者的跨语言研究（实验1）为字母目标基本搜索策略的普遍性提供了证据。反应手对两组读者的搜索函数产生了不对称的影响，尽管目标与字符串之间的大小写差异总体上增加了反应时间，但经典的M形函数仍然存在。在实验2中，我们采用了受试者内设计，研究了双语普通话/英语读者对字母和表意文字产生不同搜索函数的程度。与预期一致，这些读者对字母表现出M形函数，而对表意文字表现出更U形的函数。反应手对两种类型的材料都产生了一致的影响。综上所述，这些实验支持了熟练读者会形成特定文字脚本程序的观点。
