Perception is a two-way street: Feedforward and feedback phonology in visual word recognition

Greg Stone, Mickie Vanhoy, Guy C. Van Orden

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

234 Scopus citations

Abstract

The influence of phonology on visual word perception tasks is often indexed by the presence or absence of consistency effects. Consistency concerns whether there exists more than one way to pronounce a spelling body (e.g.,_INT as in HINT and PINT versus_EAP as in HEAP and LEAP). The present study considers a similar factor. Feedback consistency concerns whether there is more than one way to spell a pronunciation body (e.g., /_ip/ as in HEAP and DEEP versus /_Ob/ as in PROBE and GLOBE). Two experiments demonstrate a robust feedback consistency effect in visual lexical decision. Words with phonologic bodies that can be spelled more than one way (e.g.,_EAP as in HEAP) produce slower correct "yes" responses than words with phonologic bodies that can be spelled only one way (e.g.,_OBE as in PROBE). This result constitutes strong support for feedback, top-down models of performance in word perception tasks. Furthermore, the data suggest that previous tests of consistency effects may be misleading because they did not take into account feedback consistency.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)337-359
Number of pages23
JournalJournal of Memory and Language
Volume36
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 1997

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology
  • Language and Linguistics
  • Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
  • Linguistics and Language
  • Artificial Intelligence

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Perception is a two-way street: Feedforward and feedback phonology in visual word recognition'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this