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1. Behavioral interference or facilitation does not distinguish between competitive and noncompetitive accounts of lexical selection in word production.

   https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/rjezp  

   Oppenheim, G. (January 2021, Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society.)

   Fitch, T. (Ed.)

   One of the major debates in the field of word production is whether lexical selection is competitive or not. For nearly half a century, semantic interference effectsin picture naming latencieshave beenclaimed as evidence for competitive (relative threshold) models of lexical selection,while semantic facilitation effects have beenclaimed as evidence for non-competitive (simple threshold) models instead.In this paper, we use a computational modelingapproach to comparethe consequences of competitive and noncompetitive selection algorithms for blocked cyclic picture naming latencies, combined with two approaches to representing taxonomic and thematic semantic features.We show thatalthough our simplemodel can capture both semantic interference and facilitation,the presence or absence of competition in the selection mechanism is unrelated to the polarity of these semantic effects.These results question the validity of prior assumptions and offer new perspectives on the origins of interference and facilitation in languageproduction. 

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2. The effects of multiple linguistic variables on picture naming in American Sign Language

   https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-021-01751-x  

   Sehyr, Zed Sevcikova; Emmorey, Karen (December 2021, Behavior Research Methods)

   Picture-naming tasks provide critical data for theories of lexical representation and retrieval and have been performed successfully in sign languages. However, the specific influences of lexical or phonological factors and stimulus properties on sign retrieval are poorly understood. To examine lexical retrieval in American Sign Language (ASL), we conducted a timed picture-naming study using 524 pictures (272 objects and 251 actions). We also compared ASL naming with previous data for spoken English for a subset of 425 pictures. Deaf ASL signers named object pictures faster and more consistently than action pictures, as previously reported for English speakers. Lexical frequency, iconicity, better name agreement, and lower phonological complexity each facilitated naming reaction times (RT)s. RTs were also faster for pictures named with shorter signs (measured by average response duration). Target name agreement was higher for pictures with more iconic and shorter ASL names. The visual complexity of pictures slowed RTs and decreased target name agreement. RTs and target name agreement were correlated for ASL and English, but agreement was lower for ASL, possibly due to the English bias of the pictures. RTs were faster for ASL, which we attributed to a smaller lexicon. Overall, the results suggest that models of lexical retrieval developed for spoken languages can be adopted for signed languages, with the exception that iconicity should be included as a factor. The open-source picture-naming data set for ASL serves as an important, first-of-its-kind resource for researchers, educators, or clinicians for a variety of research, instructional, or assessment purposes. 

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3. A Working Memory Model of Sentence Processing as Binding Morphemes to Syntactic Positions

   https://doi.org/10.1111/tops.12780  

   Keshev, Maayan; Cartner, Mandy; Meltzer‐Asscher, Aya; Dillon, Brian (January 2025, Topics in Cognitive Science)

   Abstract As they process complex linguistic input, language comprehenders must maintain a mapping between lexical items (e.g., morphemes) and their syntactic position in the sentence. We propose a model of how these morpheme‐position bindings are encoded, maintained, and reaccessed in working memory, based on working memory models such as “serial‐order‐in‐a‐box” and its SOB‐Complex Span version. Like those models, our model of linguistic working memory derives a range of attested memory interference effects from the process of binding items to positions in working memory. We present simulation results capturing similarity‐based interference as well as item distortion effects. Our model provides a unified account of these two major classes of interference effects in sentence processing, attributing both types of effects to an associative memory architecture underpinning linguistic computation. 

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4. A meta-analytic review of morphological priming in Semitic languages

   https://doi.org/10.1075/ml.00024.xu  

   Xu, Lily; Solá-Llonch, Elizabeth; Wang, Huilei; Sundara, Megha (December 2023, The Mental Lexicon)

   Abstract Two types of discontinuous morphemes are thought to be the basic building blocks of words in Semitic languages: roots and templates. However, the role of these morphemes in lexical access and representation is debated. Priming experiments, where reaction times to target words are predicted to be faster when preceded by morphologically-related primes compared to unrelated control primes, provide conflicting evidence bearing on this debate. We used meta-analysis to synthesise the findings from 229 priming experiments on 4710 unique Semitic speakers. With Bayesian modelling of the aggregate effect sizes, we found credible root and template priming in both nouns and verbs in Arabic and Hebrew. Our results show that root priming effects can be distinguished from the effects of overlap in form and meaning. However, more experiments are needed to determine if template priming effects can be distinguished from overlap in form and morphosyntactic function. 

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5. Advanced Second Language Learners of Mandarin Show Persistent Deficits for Lexical Tone Encoding in Picture-to-Word Form Matching

   https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2021.689423  

   Pelzl, Eric; Lau, Ellen; Guo, Taomei; DeKeyser, Robert (June 2021, Frontiers in communication)

   null (Ed.)

   People who grow up speaking a language without lexical tones typically find it difficult to master tonal languages after childhood. Accumulating research suggests that much of the challenge for these second language (L2) speakers has to do not with identification of the tones themselves, but with the bindings between tones and lexical units. The question that remains open is how much of these lexical binding problems are problems of encoding (incomplete knowledge of the tone-to-word relations) vs. retrieval (failure to access those relations in online processing). While recent work using lexical decision tasks suggests that both may play a role, one issue is that failure on a lexical decision task may reflect a lack of learner confidence about what is not a word, rather than non-native representation or processing of known words. Here we provide complementary evidence using a picture- phonology matching paradigm in Mandarin in which participants decide whether or not a spoken target matches a specific image, with concurrent event-related potential (ERP) recording to provide potential insight into differences in L1 and L2 tone processing strategies. As in the lexical decision case, we find that advanced L2 learners show a clear disadvantage in accurately identifying tone mismatched targets relative to vowel mismatched targets. We explore the contribution of incomplete/uncertain lexical knowledge to this performance disadvantage by examining individual data from an explicit tone knowledge post-test. Results suggest that explicit tone word knowledge and confidence explains some but not all of the errors in picture-phonology matching. Analysis of ERPs from correct trials shows some differences in the strength of L1 and L2 responses, but does not provide clear evidence toward differences in processing that could explain the L2 disadvantage for tones. In sum, these results converge with previous evidence from lexical decision tasks in showing that advanced L2 listeners continue to have difficulties with lexical tone recognition, and in suggesting that these difficulties reflect problems both in encoding lexical tone knowledge and in retrieving that knowledge in real time. 

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