Masked Priming

Milin, P., L. B. Feldman, M. Ramscar, P. Hendrix, and R. H. Baayen
In this study we present a novel set of discrimination-based indicators of language processing derived from Naive Discriminative Learning (NDL) Theory (Baayen, Milin, Filipovi´c Ður ¯ devi´c, Hendrix, & Marelli, 2011). We compare the effectiveness of these new measures with classical lexical-distributional measures — in particular, frequency counts and form similarity measures — to predict lexical decision latencies when a complete morphological segmentation of masked primes is or is not possible. Data derive from a re-analysis of a large subset of decision latencies from the English Lexicon Project (Balota et al., 2007), as well as from the results of two new masked priming studies. Results demonstrate the superiority of discrimination-based predictors over lexical-distributional predictors alone, across both the simple and primed lexical decision tasks. Comparable priming after masked CORNER and CORNEA type primes, across two experiments, fails to support early obligatory segmentation into morphemes as predicted by the morpho-orthographic account of reading. Results fit well with NDL theory, which, in conformity with word and paradigm theory (Blevins, 2003), rejects the morpheme as a relevant unit of analysis. Furthermore, results indicate that readers with greater spelling proficiency and larger vocabularies make better use of orthographic priors and handle lexical competition more efficiently.

Greek-French bilinguals were tested in three masked priming experiments with Greek primes and French targets. Related primes were the translation equivalents of target words, morphologically related to targets, or phonologically related to targets. In Experiment 1, cognate translation equivalents (phonologically similar translations) showed facilitatory priming, relative to matched phonologically related primes, in conditions in which morphologically related primes showed no effect (50-msec prime exposure). Cross-language morphological priming emerged at longer prime exposure durations (66 msec), but cognate primes continued to generate more priming than did those in the morphological condition. In Experiments 2 and 3, the level of phonological overlap across translation equivalents was varied, and priming effects were measured against those for matched phonologically related primes and those in an unrelated prime condition. When measured against the unrelated baseline, cognate primes showed the typical advantage over noncognate primes. However, this cognate advantage disappeared when priming was measured against the phonologically related prime condition. The results are discussed in terms of how translation equivalents are represented in bilingual memory.

This article presents a theoretical framework for the author’s experimental work in contemporary poetry, which has received a term cognitive poetry. In contrast to cognitive poetics, which applies the principles of cognitive psychology to interpret poetic texts, cognitive poetry applies these principles to produce poetic texts. The theoretical considerations of cognitive poetry are based on the assumption that one of the major purposes of creative work is to elicit aesthetical reaction in the beholder. The aesthetical reaction to the poetic texts could be achieved via their satiation with multiple meanings presented through multiple sensory modalities. Cognitive poetry employs techniques developed in cognitive psychology to explicitly address cognitive processes underlying construction of multiple conceptual planes. The following techniques are discussed: priming, Stroop effect, multimodal and multilingual presentations. The applications of these techniques are illustrated with examples of poetic texts produced by the author.

The authors compared sublexical and supralexical approaches to morphological processing with unam-biguous and ambiguous inflected words and words with ambiguous stems in 3 masked and unmasked priming experiments in Finnish. Experiment 1 showed equal facilitation for all prime types with a short 60-ms stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) but significant facilitation for unambiguous words only with a long 300-ms SOA. Experiment 2 showed that all potential readings of ambiguous inflections were activated under a short SOA. Whereas the prime–target form overlap did not affect the results under a short SOA, it significantly modulated the results with a long SOA. Experiment 3 confirmed that the results from masked priming were modulated by the morphological structure of the words but not by the prime–target form overlap alone. The results support approaches in which early prelexical morphological processing is driven by morph-based segmentation and form is used to cue selection between 2 candidates only during later processing.

Stem processing is an essential phase in word recognition. Most modern Romance languages, such as Catalan, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, and Spanish, have three theme vowels that define verbal classes and stem formation. However, French verbal classes are not traditionally described in terms of theme vowels. In this work, stem formation from theme vowel and allomorphic processes was investigated in French verbs. Our aim was to define the verbal stem formation structure processed during mental lexicon access in French. We conducted a cross-modal experiment and a masked priming experiment on different French stem formation processes from the first and third classes. We compared morphology-related priming effects to full priming obtained through identity priming, as well as to no priming obtained through a control condition. Stems from the first and third classes with a theme vowel presented full priming, whereas stems from the third class with allomorphy presented partial priming in both experiments. Our results suggest root-based stem formation for French. Verbs are recognized through word decomposition into stem and inflectional suffixes, and stem processing is based on root, theme vowel, and allomorphic processes. These results support a single-mechanism model with full decomposition and pre-lexical access defined by morphological rules.

Participants performed a priming task during which emotional faces served as prime stimuli and emotional words served as targets. Prime-target pairs were congruent or incongruent and two levels of prime visibility were obtained by varying the duration of the masked primes. To probe a neural signature of the impact of the masked primes, lateralized readiness potentials (LRPs) were recorded over motor cortex. During the high-visibility condition, responses to word targets were faster when the prime-target pairs were congruent than when they were incongruent, providing evidence of priming effects. In line with the behavioral results, the electrophysiological data showed that high-visibility face primes resulted in LRP differences between congruent and incongruent trials, suggesting that prime stimuli initiated motor preparation. Contrary to the above pattern, no evidence for reaction time or LRP differences was observed during the low-visibility condition, revealing that the depth of facial expression processing is dependent upon stimulus visibility.

Following Silva & Clahsen seminal work, psycholinguistic research on L2 morphological processing has mainly adopted a morpheme-based, decompo-sitional dual route approach suggesting that L2 learners have a limited access to morphological representation during processing and consequently rely more on lexical storage (Clahsen H, Felser C, Neubauer K, Sato M, Silva R, Lang Learn 60:21-43, 2010; Clahsen and Felser, 2017). Therefore, experimental research, which largely used the masked priming paradigm, mainly focused on the distinction between storage and computation as two alternative, mutually exclusive and competing mechanisms. In this paper, we claim that a word-based approach, which considers morphology in terms of constructional schemas, allows us to overcome the rule vs. list fallacy and therefore reshapes the dichotomy between L1 and L2 processing mechanisms. Although a consistent proposal is still out of reach, given that data on L2 processing are limited, we will discuss the advantages of a model which jointly considers formal and semantic similarities, as well as paradigmatic proprieties.

Visual stimuli may remain invisible but nevertheless produce strong and reliable effects on subsequent actions. How well features of a masked prime are perceived depends crucially on its physical parameters and those of the mask. We manipulated the visibility of masked stimuli and contrasted it with their influence on the speed of motor actions, comparing the temporal dynamics of visual awareness in metacontrast masking with that of action priming under the same conditions. We observed priming with identical time course for reportable and invisible prime stimuli, despite qualitative changes in the masking time course. Our findings indicate that experimental variations that modify the subjective visual experience of masked stimuli have no effect on motor effects of those stimuli in early processing. We propose a model that provides a quantitative account of priming effects on response speed and accuracy.

Wentura and Frings (2005) reported evidence of subliminal categorical priming on a lexical decision task, using a new method of visual masking in which the prime string consisted of the prime word flanked by random consonants and random letter masks alternated with the prime string on successive refresh cycles. We investigated associative and repetition priming on lexical decision, using the