Semantic Richness and Aging: The Effect of Number of Features in the Lexical Decision Task
Language
EN
Article de revue
This item was published in
Journal of Psycholinguistic Research. 2015-02-14, vol. 45, p. 359-365
English Abstract
The aim of this study was to examine whether the effect of semantic richness in visual word recognition (i.e., words with a rich semantic representation are faster to recognize than words with a poorer semantic representation), ...Read more >
The aim of this study was to examine whether the effect of semantic richness in visual word recognition (i.e., words with a rich semantic representation are faster to recognize than words with a poorer semantic representation), is changed with aging. Semantic richness was investigated by manipulating the number of features of words (NOF), i.e., the number of characteristics that describe the meaning of words. Half of the words had a high NOF and the other half had a low NOF. Young adults (19.6 years) and older adults (66.3 years) performed a lexical decision task. An interaction was found between age group and NOF on word latencies. More precisely, a facilitatory effect of NOF was observed for the young adults, but not for the older ones. These data are consistent with the assumption of an age-related decline in feedback activation from semantics to orthography.Read less <
English Keywords
Semantic richness
Visual word recognition
Feedback activation
Lexical decision task
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