A re-evaluation of the phonological similarity effect in adults' short-term memory of words and nonwords

In normal adults, concurrent articulation impairs short-term memory, abolishing both the phonological similarity effect and the word length effect when visual presentation is used. It also interferes with ability to judge whether visually presented words rhyme. It is generally assumed that concurrent articulation impairs performance because it prevents people from recoding material into an articulatory form. If this is the explanation, then individuals who are congenitally speechless (anarthric) or speech-impaired (dysarthric) should show the same impairments as normal individuals who are concurrently articulating—i.e. they should have reduced memory spans, fail to show word length and phonological similarity effects in short-term memory, and find rhyme judgement difficult. These predictions were tested in a study of 48 cerebral palsied individuals: 12 anarthric, 12 dysarthric, and 24 controls individually matched to the speech-impaired subjects. There was no impairment of memory span in speech-impaired subjects, who showed normal phonological similarity and word-length effects in short-term memory. Speech-impaired subjects did not differ from their controls in ability to tell whether names of pairs of pictures rhymed. These results challenge the notion that “articulatory coding” is implicated in short-term memory and rhyme judgement and suggests that processes such as rehearsal and phonemic segmentation involve generation of a more abstract central phonological code.

Download Full-text

Verbal Short-Term Memory and Motor Speech Processes in Broca’s Aphasia

Behavioural Neurology ◽

10.1155/1995/369797 ◽

1995 ◽

Vol 8 (2) ◽

pp. 81-91 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

C. Goerlich ◽

I. Daum ◽

I. Hertrich ◽

H. Ackermann

Keyword(s):

Word Length ◽

Articulatory Suppression ◽

Short Term Memory ◽

Speech Rate ◽

Phonological Similarity ◽

Short Term ◽

Motor Speech ◽

Term Memory ◽

Control Subjects ◽

Broca’S Aphasia

The present study investigated the relationship between verbal short-term memory and motor speech processes in healthy control subjects and five patients suffering from Broca's aphasia. Control subjects showed a phonological similarity effect, a word length effect and an articulatory suppression effect, supporting the hypothesis of a phonological store and an articulatory loop component of short-term memory. A similar effect of phonological similarity was observed in the aphasic patients, while the effects of word length and articulatory suppression were reduced. In control subjects, measures of short-term memory were correlated to measures of motor speech rate only if speech rate was assessed in more complex conditions (such as sentence rather than syllable repetition). There was also evidence of an association of speech impairment and short-term memory deficits in the aphasic patients.

Download Full-text

Rate of presentation and the acoustic similarity effect in short-term memory

Psychonomic Science ◽

10.3758/bf03328368 ◽

1966 ◽

Vol 5 (6) ◽

pp. 233-234 ◽

Cited By ~ 17

Author(s):

R. Conrad ◽

A. D. Baddeley ◽

A. J. Hull

Keyword(s):

Short Term Memory ◽

Acoustic Similarity ◽

Short Term ◽

Term Memory ◽

Similarity Effect

Download Full-text

Effects of Irrelevant Sounds on Phonological Coding in Reading Comprehension and Short term Memory

The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Section A ◽

10.1080/713755630 ◽

1996 ◽

Vol 49 (2) ◽

pp. 398-416 ◽

Cited By ~ 23

Author(s):

Robyn Boyle ◽

Veronika Coltheart

Keyword(s):

Reading Comprehension ◽

Relative Clause ◽

Instrumental Music ◽

Short Term Memory ◽

Phonological Similarity ◽

Error Rates ◽

Syntactic Complexity ◽

Short Term ◽

Term Memory ◽

Phonological Coding

The effects of irrelevant sounds on reading comprehension and short-term memory were studied in two experiments. In Experiment 1, adults judged the acceptability of written sentences during irrelevent speech, accompanied and unaccompanied singing, instrumental music, and in silence. Sentences varied in syntactic complexity: Simple sentences contained a right-branching relative clause ( The applause pleased the woman that gave the speech) and syntactically complex sentences included a centre-embedded relative clause ( The hay that the farmer stored fed the hungry animals). Unacceptable sentences either sounded acceptable ( The dog chased the cat that eight up all his food) or did not ( The man praised the child that sight up his spinach). Decision accuracy was impaired by syntactic complexity but not by irrelevant sounds. Phonological coding was indicated by increased errors on unacceptable sentences that sounded correct. These error rates were unaffected by irrelevant sounds. Experiment 2 examined effects of irrelevant sounds on ordered recall of phonologically similar and dissimilar word lists. Phonological similarity impaired recall. Irrelevant speech reduced recall but did not interact with phonological similarity. The results of these experiments question assumptions about the relationship between speech input and phonological coding in reading and the short-term store.

Download Full-text

Phonological similarity neighborhoods and children’s short-term memory: Typical development and dyslexia

Memory & Cognition ◽

10.3758/bf03193223 ◽

2005 ◽

Vol 33 (7) ◽

pp. 1210-1219 ◽

Cited By ~ 39

Author(s):

Jennifer M. Thomson ◽

Ulla Richardson ◽

Usha Goswami

Keyword(s):

Short Term Memory ◽

Phonological Similarity ◽

Typical Development ◽

Short Term ◽

Term Memory

Download Full-text

Effects of Lexical Competition on Immediate Memory Span for Spoken Words

The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Section A ◽

10.1080/02724980244000710 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 56 (6) ◽

pp. 929-954 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Winston D. Goh ◽

David B. Pisoni

Keyword(s):

Short Term Memory ◽

Memory Span ◽

Item Type ◽

Phonological Similarity ◽

Lexical Competition ◽

Short Term ◽

Term Memory ◽

Immediate Memory ◽

Spoken Words ◽

Sampling Procedures

Current theories and models of the structural organization of verbal short-term memory are primarily based on evidence obtained from manipulations of features inherent in the short-term traces of the presented stimuli, such as phonological similarity. In the present study, we investigated whether properties of the stimuli that are not inherent in the short-term traces of spoken words would affect performance in an immediate memory span task. We studied the lexical neighbourhood properties of the stimulus items, which are based on the structure and organization of words in the mental lexicon. The experiments manipulated lexical competition by varying the phonological neighbourhood structure (i.e., neighbourhood density and neighbourhood frequency) of the words on a test list while controlling for word frequency and intra-set phonological similarity (family size). Immediate memory span for spoken words was measured under repeated and nonrepeated sampling procedures. The results demonstrated that lexical competition only emerged when a nonrepeated sampling procedure was used and the participants had to access new words from their lexicons. These findings were not dependent on individual differences in short-term memory capacity. Additional results showed that the lexical competition effects did not interact with proactive interference. Analyses of error patterns indicated that item-type errors, but not positional errors, were influenced by the lexical attributes of the stimulus items. These results complement and extend previous findings that have argued for separate contributions of long-term knowledge and short-term memory rehearsal processes in immediate verbal serial recall tasks.

Download Full-text

Phonological Similarity and Lexicality Effects in Children's Verbal Short-Term Memory: Concerns about the Interpretation of Probed Recall Data

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology ◽

10.1080/17470210701202210 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 61 (2) ◽

pp. 324-340 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Christopher Jarrold ◽

Joanne Cocksey ◽

Emma Dockerill

Keyword(s):

Short Term Memory ◽

Phonological Similarity ◽

Short Term ◽

Term Memory ◽

Recall Data ◽

Memory Concerns

Download Full-text

How Does Acoustic Similarity Influence Short-Term Memory?

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology ◽

10.1080/14640746808400159 ◽

1968 ◽

Vol 20 (3) ◽

pp. 249-264 ◽

Cited By ~ 129

Author(s):

A. D. Baddeley

Keyword(s):

Short Term Memory ◽

The Other ◽

Acoustic Similarity ◽

Short Term ◽

Term Memory ◽

Listening Test ◽

Impaired Performance ◽

Retrieval Cues ◽

Similarity Effect ◽

And Control

This study attempts to discover why items which are similar in sound are hard to recall in a short-term memory situation. The input, storage, and retrieval stages of the memory system are examined separately. Experiments I, II and III use a modification of the Peterson and Peterson technique to plot short-term forgetting curves for sequences of acoustically similar and control words. If acoustically similar sequences are stored less efficiently, they should be forgotten more rapidly. All three experiments show a parallel rate of forgetting for acoustically similar and control sequences, suggesting that the acoustic similarity effect does not occur during storage. Two input hypotheses are then examined, one involving a simple sensory trace, the other an overloading of a system which must both discriminate and memorize at the same time. Both predict that short-term memory for spoken word sequences should deteriorate when the level of background noise is increased. Subjects performed both a listening test and a memory test in which they attempted to recall sequences of five words. Noise impaired performance on the listening test but had no significant effect on retention, thus supporting neither of the input hypotheses. The final experiments studied two retrieval hypotheses. The first of these, Wickelgren's phonemic-associative hypotheses attributes the acoustic similarity effect to inter-item associations. It predicts that, when sequences comprising a mixture of similar and dissimilar items are recalled, errors should follow acoustically similar items. The second hypothesis attributes the effect to the overloading of retrieval cues which consequently do not discriminate adequately among available responses. It predicts maximum error rate on, not following, similar items. Two experiments were performed, one involving recall of visually presented letter sequences, the other of auditorily presented word sequences. Both showed a marked tendency for errors to coincide with acoustically similar items, as the second hypothesis would predict. It is suggested that the acoustic similarity effect occurs at retrieval and is due to the overloading of retrieval cues.

Download Full-text