What Happens When Experts Over- or Underestimate a Layperson's Knowledge in Communication? Effects on Learning and Question Asking
Year: 2005
Type: article
Abstract: Form-priming of Language: Inhibition and Facilitation Sven Van Lommel ([email protected]) Laboratory of Experimental Psychology, Tiensestraat 102 B-3000 Leuven, Belgium Gery d'Ydewalle ([email protected]) Laboratory of Experimental Psychology, Tiensestraat 102 B-3000 Leuven, Belgium Abstract In various priming paradigms, segmental overlap (i.e. phonological or orthographical overlap) between the target and prime word has been demonstrated to facilitate picture naming. But features extending over several segments are rarely controlled for in stimulus selection. Some attention has been paid to such suprasegmental features, but inconsistent findings have been obtained. The presented studies took up this issue and the combination of word stress and vowel quality was investigated in a picture-word task. In the picture- word interference task, pictures are named while attempting to ignore simultaneously presented distractors words. A series of three experiments presented Dutch target and distractor words of three possible suprasegmental patterns while controlling for a manifold of variables. Distractor words inhibited picture naming for picture targets of a fully related suprasegmental pattern. A fourth experiment obtained a facilitatory main effect of segmental overlap, whereas the suprasegmental effect dissipated when suprasegmental features are manipulated in the presence of segmental overlap. This observation clarifies results of Experiment 3 in which segmental overlap was an artefact of the manipulation of suprasegmental overlap. Inhibitory form priming has been observed in other picture naming paradigms and variants of the picture-word task. An account was extrapolated from these instances, as an attempt to cover both facilitatory, inhibitory, and null effects of suprasegmental overlap. Introduction Many theories have adopted a frame-content approach to speech production in which language structure (‘frames’) and content (‘fillers’) are distinguished as separate representations. In line with a frame-content approach, a phonological representation could comprise a separate suprasegmental representation that is independent of the segmental content and might be susceptible to priming. Generally, segmental overlap between target and distractor word has been demonstrated to facilitate speech production in various paradigms, such as the picture-word interference task (e.g., Posnansky & Rayner, 1978), the translation naming task (e.g., La Heij et al., 1990), and the implicit priming paradigm (e.g., Meyer, 1990). Thus far, little attention has been paid to features extending over several segments, especially word stress and vowel quality, and suprasegmental features are rarely controlled for in stimulus selection. Nevertheless, some suprasegmentals are (reasonably) fixed word properties, such as word stress and vowel quality. Attempts to prime the stress pattern of a word led to diverse findings and interpretations. Depending on the particular stress pattern, the effect of stress overlap ranges from facilitation to inhibition, or no effect is produced unless in combination with segmental overlap (Meijer, 1994; Roelofs & Meyer, 1998; Schiller, Fikkert, & C.C. Levelt, 2004). The picture word-interference task led to facilitatory effects of overlap in word-initial stress and inhibitory effects of overlap in word-final stress (Schiller et al., 2004, Experiments 1, 2, and 3). Mixing both stress types, Meijer (1994, Experiment 1) obtained facilitatory effects of stress overlap and of segmental overlap, that did not interact. In a subset of Experiment 1 however, the stress effect was restricted to the conditions with segmental overlap. Using the word translation task, Meijer (1994, Experiment 2 and 3) confirmed the latter pattern, but the segmental overlap yielded inhibition instead of facilitation. Meijers (1994) Experiments 7 and 8 manipulated stress overlap within segmental overlap and mismatching syllable number: monosyllabic targets were combined with disyllabic primes carrying initial versus non-initial stress. A facilitatory effect of stress overlap was obtained in Experiment 8 only. Experiment 9 crossed stress overlap and segmental overlap within mismatching syllable number. A facilitatory effect of stress overlap was found regardless of segmental overlap whereas segmental overlap yielded inhibition within different stress and facilitation within same stress. Stress overlap in implicit priming experiments (Roelofs & Meyer, 1998) resulted in no effect (Experiment 5 with initial and non-initial stress targets put together) or an inhibitory effect (Experiment 2, using non-initial stress on second and third syllable). Experiment 2 crossed stress overlap with segmental overlap. A facilitatory effect of stress overlap was obtained in the conditions with segmental overlap, but only for the subset of targets bearing stress on the second syllable. Segmental overlap also facilitated production latencies but the effect was restricted to the conditions with stress overlap. Summarizing, some experiments showed a facilitatory effect of stress overlap (Meijer, 1994, Experiments 1 and 9). But such facilitation could also be restricted to overlap in word-initial stress whereas overlap in word-final stress led
Authors: Catherine G. O’Hanlon, Debi Roberson
Language: English
Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2595671216