Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-11T03:45:23.718Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Semantic Priming Effects in a Lexical Decision Task: Comparing third Graders and College Students in two Different Stimulus Onset Asynchronies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2013

Candice Steffen Holderbaum  and
Jerusa Fumagalli de Salles
Candice Steffen Holderbaum*
Affiliation:
Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
Jerusa Fumagalli de Salles
Affiliation:
Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
*
Corresponding concerning this article should be addressed to: Candice Steffen Holderbaum. Instituto de Psicologia – UFRGS -Rua Ramiro Barcellos, 2600, Bairro Santa Cecília. 90690-300. Porto Alegre – RS. (Brazil). Phone: +55-51-33085111. E-mail: candibaum@hotmail.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Differences in the semantic priming effect comparing child and adult performance have been found by some studies. However, these differences are not well established, mostly because of the variety of methods used by researchers around the world. One of the main issues concerns the absence of semantic priming effects on children at stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) smaller than 300ms. The aim of this study was to compare the semantic priming effect between third graders and college students at two different SOAs: 250ms and 500ms. Participants performed lexical decisions to targets which were preceded by semantic related or unrelated primes. Semantic priming effects were found at both SOAs in the third graders' group and in college students. Despite the fact that there was no difference between groups in the magnitude of semantic priming effects when SOA was 250ms, at the 500ms SOA their magnitude was bigger in children, corroborating previous studies. Hypotheses which could explain the presence of semantic priming effects in children's performance when SOA was 250ms are discussed, as well as hypotheses for the larger magnitude of semantic priming effects in children when SOA was 500ms.

Algunos estudios han encontrado diferencias en la comparación del efecto de facilitación semántica entre adultos y niños. No obstante, estas diferencias no están bien establecidas, mayoritariamente debido a la variedad de métodos utilizados por los investigadores de todo el mundo. Uno de los aspectos principales concierne a la ausencia de efectos de facilitación semántica en niños con intervalos entre estímulos (stimulus onset asynchrony; SOA) menores de 300ms. El objetivo de este estudio fue comparar el efecto de facilitación semántica entre alumnos de tercer grado y alumnos de bachillerato con dos SOAs: 250 ms y 500ms. Los participantes completaron decisiones léxicas ante objetivos que fueron precedidos por primes relacionados o no relacionados. Se encontraron efectos de facilitación semántica en los dos SOAs en alumnos de tercer grado y de bachillerato. Pese al hecho de que no hubo diferencias entre los grupos en la magnitud del efecto de facilitación cuando el SOA era de 250 ms, con SOA de 500 ms la magnitud era mayor en niños, corroborando previos estudios. Se discuten las hipótesis que podrían explicar la presencia de efectos de facilitación semántica en la ejecución de niños cuando el SOA era de 250ms, así como las hipótesis para mayor magnitud de efectos de facilitación semántica en niños cuando el SOA era de 500ms.

Keywords

semantic priminglexical decisionchildrenadultsstimulus onset asynchronyfacilitación semánticadecisión léxicaniñosadultosasincronía de presentación de estímulos
Type
Research Article
Information
The Spanish Journal of Psychology , Volume 14 , Issue 2 , November 2011 , pp. 589 - 599
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Altarriba, J., & Basnight-Brown, D. M. (2007). Methodological considerations in performing semantic – and translation – priming experiments across languages. Behavior Research Methods, 39(1), 1–18. doi:10.3758/BF03192839CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Anaki, D., & Henik, A. (2003). Is there a ‘strength effect’ in automatic semantic priming? Memory and Cognition, 31(2), 262–272. doi:10.3758/BF03194385CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Assink, E. M., Bergen, F. V., Teeseling, H. V., & Knuijt, P. P. (2004). Semantic priming effects in normal versus poor readers. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 165(1), 67–79. doi:10.3200/GNTP.165.1.67-80CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Basnight-Brown, D. M., & Altarriba, J. (2007). Differences in semantic and translation priming across languages: The role of language direction and language dominance. Memory and Cognition, 35(5), 953–965. doi:10.3758/BF03193468CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Becker, A. C. (1980). Semantic contexts effects in visual word recognition: An analysis of semantic strategies. Memory and Cognition, 8(6), 493–512. doi:10.3758/BF03213769CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Becker, S., Moscovitch, M., Behrmann, M., & Joordens, S. (1997). Long-term semantic priming: A computational account and empirical evidence. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 23(5), 1059–1082. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.23.5.1059Google ScholarPubMed
Betjemann, R. S., & Keenan, J. M. (2008). Phonological and semantic priming in children with reading disabilities. Child Development, 79(4), 1086–1102. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01177.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumstein, S. E., Milberg, W., Brown, T., Hutchinson, A., Kurowski, K., & Burton, M. W. (2000). The mapping from sound structure to the lexicon in aphasia: Evidence from rhyme and repetition priming. Brain and Language 72, 75–99. doi:10.1006/brln.1999.2276CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bolognani, S. A., Gouveia, P. A., Brucki, S. M., & Bueno, O. F. (2000). Memória implícita e sua contribuição à reabilitação de um paciente amnéstico [Implicit memory and its contribution to the rehabilitation of an amnesic patient]. Arquivos de Neuropsquiatria, 58 (3-B), 924–930. doi:10.1590/S0004-282X2000000500023CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cañas, J. J. (1990). Associative strength effects in the lexical decision task. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 42, 121–145.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chiarello, C., Burgess, C., Richards, L., & Pollock, A. (1990). Semantic and associative priming in the cerebral hemispheres: Some words do, some words don't …sometimes, some places. Brain and Language, 38, 75–104. doi:10.1016/0093-934X(90)90103-NCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Collins, A. M., & Loftus, E. F. (1975). A spreading-activation theory of semantic priming. Psychological Review, 82 (6), 407–428. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.82.6.407CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coney, J. (2002). The effect of associative strength on priming in the cerebral hemispheres. Brain and Cognition, 50, 234–241. doi:10.1016/S0278-2626(02)00507-9CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Coltheart, M., Rastle, K., Perry, C., Langdon, R., & Ziegler, T. (2001). DRC: dual-route cascaded model of visual word recognition and reading aloud. Psychological Review, 108(1), 204–256. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.108.1.204CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chwilla, D. J., Hagoort, P., & Brown, C. M. (1998). The mechanism underlying backward priming in a lexical decision task: Spreading activation versus semantic matching. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 51A(3), 531–560. doi:10.1080/713755773CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davenport, J. L., & Potter, M. C. (2005). The locus of semantic priming in RSVP target search. Memory and Cognition, 33(2), 241–248. doi:10.3758/BF03195313CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Del Vecchio, N., Liporace, J., Nei, M., Sperling, M., & Tracy, J. (2004). A dissociation between implicit and explicit verbal memory in left temporal lobe epilepsy. Epilepsia, 45, 1124–1133. doi:10.1111/j.0013-9580.2004.28903.xCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ferrand, L., & New, B. (2003). Semantic and associative priming in the mental lexicon. In Bonin, P. (Ed.), Mental lexicon: Some words to talk about words. (pp. 25–43). Hauppauge, NY: Nova Science.Google Scholar
Frost, R., & Bentin, S. (1992). Processing phonological and semantic ambiguity: Evidence from semantic priming at different SOAs. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 18(1), 58–68. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.18.1.58Google ScholarPubMed
Gathercole, S. (1998). The development of memory. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 39, 3–27. doi:10.1111/1469-7610.00301CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Giffard, B., Laisney, M., Mézenge, F., Sayette, V., Eustache, F., & Desgranges, B. (2008). The neural substrates of semantic memory deficits in early Alzheimer's disease: Clues from semantic priming effects and FDG-PET. Neuropsychologia, 46, 1657–1666. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2007.12.031CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gorfein, D. S. (2001). On the consequences of meaning selection: An overview. In Gorfein, D. (Ed.). On the consequences of meaning selection: Perspectives on resolving lexical ambiguity (pp. 3–8). Washington, WA: American Psychological Association.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hagoort, P. (1997). Semantic Priming in Broca's Aphasics at a Short SOA: No Support for an Automatic Access Deficit. Brain and Language, 56, 287–300. doi:10.1006/brln.1997.1849CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hala, S., Pexman, P. M., & Glenwright, M. (2007). Priming the meaning of homographs in typically developing children and children with autism. Journal of Autism Development Disorder, 37, 329–340. doi:10.1007/s10803-006-0162-6CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hernández, M., Costa, A., Juncadella, M., Sebastián-Gallés, N., & Reñé, R. (2008). Category-specific semantic deficits in Alzheimer's disease: A semantic priming study. Neuropsychologia, 46, 935–946. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia. 2007.11.018CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hirsh, K. W., & Tree, J. J. (2001). Word association norms for two cohorts of British adults. Journal of Neurolinguistics, 14, 1–44. doi:10.1016/S0911-6044(00)00002-6CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hutchinson, K. A. (2002). The effect of asymmetrical association on positive and negative semantic priming. Memory & Cognition, 30(8), 1263–1276. doi:10.3758/BF03213408CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hutchinson, K. A. (2003). Is semantic priming due to association strength or feature overlap? A microanalytic review. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 10(4), 785–813. doi:10.3758/BF03196544CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hutchison, K. A. (2007). Attentional control and the relatedness proportion effect in semantic priming. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 33(4), 645–662. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.33.4.645Google ScholarPubMed
Leritz, E. C., Grande, L. J., & Bauer, R. M. (2006). Temporal lobe epilepsy as a model to understand human memory: The distinction between explicit and implicit memory. Epilepsy & Behavior, 9, 1–13. doi:10.1016/j.yebeh.2006.04.012CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lucas, M. (2000). Semantic priming without association: A meta-analytic review. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 7(4), 618–630. doi:10.3758/BF03212999CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Macizo, P., Gómez-Ariza, C. J., & Bajo, M. T. (2000). Associative norms of 58 Spanish words for children from 8 to 13 years old. Psicológica, 21, 287–300.Google Scholar
Masson, M. E. J. (1995). A distributed memory model of semantic priming. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 21(1), 3–23. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.21.1.3Google Scholar
McClelland, J. L., &. Rogers, T. T. (2003). The parallel distributed processing approach to semantic cognition. Nature Reviews: Neuroscience, 4, 310–322. doi:10.1038/nrn1076CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McNamara, T. P. (1994). Theories of priming: II. Types of primes. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 20(3), 507–520. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.20.3.507Google Scholar
McNamara, T. P. (2005). Semantic priming: Perspectives from memory and word recognition. New York, NY: Psychology Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McRae, K., & Boisvert, S. (1998). Automatic semantic similarity priming. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 24(3), 558–572. doi:10.1037/0278 -7393.24.3.558Google Scholar
McRae, K., de Sa, V. R., & Seinderberg, M. S. (1997). On the nature and scope of featural representations of word meaning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 126(2), 99–130. doi:10.1037/00963445.126.2.99CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Meyer, D. E., & Schvaneveldt, R. W. (1971). Facilitation in recognizing pairs of words: Evidence of a dependence between retrieval operations. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 90, 227–234. doi:10.1037/h0031564CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Milberg, W., & Blumstein, S. E. (1981). Lexical decision and aphasia: evidence for semantic processing. Brain and Language, 14(2), 371–385. doi:10.1016/0093-934X(81)90086-9CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Milberg, W., Blumstein, S. E., & Dworetzky, B. (1987). Processing of lexical ambiguities in aphasia. Brain and Language, 31, 138–150. doi:10.1016/0093-934X(87)90065-4CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nakamura, E., Ohta, K., Okita, Y., Ozaki, J., & Matsushima, E. (2006). Increased inhibition and decreased facilitation effect during a lexical decision task in children. Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences, 60(2), 232–239. doi:10.1111/j.1440-1819.2006.01491.xCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Neely, J. H. (1991). Semantic priming effects in visual word recognition: A selective review of current findings and theories. In Besner, D. & Humphreys, G. H., Basic processes in reading, visual word recognition (pp. 264–336). New Jersey, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Nievas, F., & Justicia, F. (2003). Development of memory structures for homographs using Pathfinder network representations. Spanish Journal of Psychology, 6(1), 12–27.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nievas, F., & Justicia, F. (2004). A cross-sectional study about meaning access processes for homographs. Cognitive Development, 19, 95–109. doi:10.1016/j.cogdev. 2003.11.002CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nobre, A. C., & McCarthy, G. (1995). Language-related field potentials in the anterior-medial temporal lobe: II. Effects of word type and semantic priming. The Journal of Neuroscience, 15(2), 1090–1098.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Perea, M., Duñabeitia, J. A., & Carreiras, M. (2008). Masked associative/semantic priming effects across languages with highly proficient bilinguals. Journal of Memory and Language, 58, 916–930. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2008.01.003CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Perea, M., & Gotor, A. (1997). Associative and semantic priming effects occur at very short stimulus-onset asynchronies in lexical decision and naming. Cognition, 62, 223–240. doi:10.1016/S0010-0277(96)00782-2CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Perea, M., & Rosa, E. (2002). The effects of associative and semantic priming in the lexical decision task. Psychological Research, 66, 180–194. doi:10.1007/s00426-002-0086-5CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pinheiro, A. M. V. (1996). Contagem de freqüência de ocorrência de palavras expostas a crianças na faixa pré escolar e séries iniciais do Io grau [Counting the occurring frequency of words exposed to children in kinder garden and first years at school]. [Software]. São Paulo, Brazil: Associação Brasileira de Dislexia.Google Scholar
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(4), 786–823. doi:10.1037//0033-295X.107.4.786CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pratarelli, M. E., Perry, K. E., & Galloway, A. M. (1994). Automatic lexical access in children: New evidence from masked identity-priming. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 58(3), 346–358. doi:10.1006/jecp.1994.1039CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salles, J. F., Machado, L. L., & Holderbaum, C. S. (2009). Normas de associação semântica de 50 palavras do português brasileiro para crianças: tipo, força de associação e set size [Norms of semantic association for 50 brazilian Portuguese words for children: type, association strength and set size]. Revista Interamericana de Psicologia, 43(1), 57–67.Google Scholar
Salles, J. F., & Parente, M. A. M. P. (2007) Avaliação da leitura e escrita de palavras em crianças de 2ª série: abordagem neuropsicológica cognitiva [Evaluation of reading and writing words in second graders: a cognitive neuropsychological approach]. Psicologia. Reflexão e Crítica, 20(2), 218–226. doi:10.1590/S0102-79722007000200007CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sánchez-Casas, R., Ferré, P., García-Albea, J. E., & Guasch, M. (2006). The nature of semantic priming: Effects of the degree of semantic similarity between primes and targets in Spanish. European Journal of Cognitive Psychology. 18(2), 161–184. doi:10.1080/09541440500183830CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schvaneveldt, R., Ackerman, B. P., & Semlear, T. (1977). The effect of semantic context on children's word recognition. Child Development, 48(2), 612–616.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schwantes, F. M. (1981). Developmental differences in cognitive scanning and encoding of visual information. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 34(2), 301–310. doi:10.1016/0022 -0965(82)90048-0CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schwantes, F. M., Boesl, S. L., & Ritz, E. G. (1980). Children's use of context in word recognition: A psycholinguistic guessing name. Child Development, 51, 730–736.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, G. B., & Foster, M. R. (1986). Lexical ambiguity and children's word recognition. Developmental Psychology, 22(2), 147–154. doi:10.1037//0012-1649.22.2.147CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, G. B., & Lorsbach, T. C. (1987). Automatic and conscious context effects in average and advanced readers. Journal of Research in Reading, 10(2), 110–112. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9817.1987.tb00288.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, G. B., & Lorsbach, T. C. (1983). The development of automatic and conscious components of contextual facilitation. Child Development, 54, 760–772. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.1983.tb00501.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Torkildsen, J. V., Syversen, G., Simonsen, H. G., Moen, I., & Lindgren, M. (2007). Brain responses to lexical-semantic priming in children at-risk for dyslexia. Brain and Language, 102(3), 243–261. doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2006.11.010CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Valdés, B., Catena, A., & Marí-Beffa, P. (2005). Automatic and controlled semantic processing: A masked prime-task effect. Consciousness and Cognition, 14, 278–295. doi:10.1016/j.concog.2004.08.001CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Van Erven, T. J. C. G., & Janczura, G. A. (2004). A memória dos idosos em tarefas complexas [The memory of elderly ones in complex tasks]. Psicologia: Teoria e Pesquisa, 20(1), 59–68. doi:10.1590/S0102-37722004000100008Google Scholar