An Electrophysiological and Psychophysical Analysis of Hypnotic Visual Hallucinations

We examined the physiological and behavioral concomitants of high hypnotizable subjects reporting the capacity to hypnotically hallucinate. Subjects were required to perform a lexical decision task under baseline and four hypnotic hallucination conditions: obstructive, transparent, negative, and semantic. Analyses were conducted on various evoked potential components and psychophysical indices (RTs, sensitivity, response bias). Overall, hypnotic hallucinations did not alter VEPs over baseline; however, more liberal analyses indicated that the obstructive hallucination produced suppressions in the VEPs at P1 (left occipital), P2 (midline parietal) and P3 (midline parietal) compared to baseline. P1 latencies were also larger in the obstructive condition. Lexical decisions took longer in the hallucination conditions, and both sensitivity and response bias were reduced in these conditions. The relationship of these indices to attention are discussed.

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Connecting the research fields of lexical ambiguity and figures of speech

The Mental Lexicon ◽

10.1075/ml.10.1.05jag ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

pp. 133-151 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Bernadet Jager ◽

Alexandra A. Cleland

Keyword(s):

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Decision Task ◽

Categorization Task ◽

Semantic Categorization ◽

Figures Of Speech ◽

Research Fields ◽

Processing And Storage ◽

The Relationship ◽

And Storage

The current studies investigated the processing and storage of lexical metaphors and metonyms by combining two existing methodologies from ambiguity research: counting the number of senses (as in e.g., Rodd, Gaskell, & Marslen-Wilson, 2002) and determining the relationship between those senses (as in e.g., Klepousniotou & Baum, 2007). We have called these two types of ambiguity ‘numerical polysemy’ and ‘relational polysemy’. Studies employing a lexical decision task (Experiment 1) and semantic categorization task (Experiment 2) compared processing of metaphorical and non-metaphorical words while controlling for number of senses. The effects of relational polysemy were investigated in more detail with a further lexical decision study (Experiment 3). Results showed a metaphor advantage and metonymy disadvantage which conflict with earlier findings of reverse patterns (e.g., Klepousniotou & Baum, 2007). The fact that both conventional lexical metaphors and metonyms can incur either processing advantages or disadvantages strongly suggests they are not inherently stored differently in the mental lexicon.

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Auditory Lexical Decisions in Children and Adults

Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research ◽

10.1044/jshr.3605.996 ◽

1993 ◽

Vol 36 (5) ◽

pp. 996-1003 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Jan Edwards ◽

Margaret Lahey

Keyword(s):

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Lexical Processing ◽

Response Times ◽

Reaction Time Task ◽

Decision Task ◽

Real Word ◽

Response Factors ◽

Lexical Decisions ◽

Age Related

This study examined the influence of nonlexical response factors on the speed of auditory lexical decisions in children and adults. Two groups of children (6- and 7-year-olds, 8- and 9-year-olds) and adults participated in three tasks: a real-word lexical decision task in which subjects were asked to say "yes" as quickly as possible to real words; a nonword lexical decision task in which subjects were asked to say "no" as quickly as possible to nonwords; and an auditory-vocal reaction time task in which subjects were asked to say "yes" or "no" to a tone. Response times on all tasks decreased with age. However, the age-related differences on the real-word lexical decision task disappeared when differences in auditory-vocal reaction times were taken into account. This result suggests that a large part of developmental differences in the speed of lexical processing may be due to nonlexical response factors.

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Can children with speech difficulties process an unfamiliar accent?

Applied Psycholinguistics ◽

10.1017/s0142716401003046 ◽

2001 ◽

Vol 22 (3) ◽

pp. 343-361 ◽

Cited By ~ 21

Author(s):

LIZ NATHAN ◽

BILL WELLS

Keyword(s):

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Phonological Processing ◽

Auditory Processing ◽

The Other ◽

Clinical Implications ◽

Decision Task ◽

Input Processing ◽

Auditory Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decisions

This study explores the hypothesis that children identified as having phonological processing problems may have particular difficulty in processing a different accent. Children with speech difficulties (n = 18) were compared with matched controls on four measures of auditory processing. First, an accent auditory lexical decision task was administered. In one condition, the children made lexical decisions about stimuli presented in their own accent (London). In the second condition, the stimuli were spoken in an unfamiliar accent (Glaswegian). The results showed that the children with speech difficulties had a specific deficit on the unfamiliar accent. Performance on the other auditory discrimination tasks revealed additional deficits at lower levels of input processing. The wider clinical implications of the findings are considered.

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Robustness of phonolexical representations relates to phonetic flexibility for difficult second language sound contrasts

Bilingualism Language and Cognition ◽

10.1017/s1366728918000925 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 22 (5) ◽

pp. 1085-1100 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

MIQUEL LLOMPART ◽

EVA REINISCH

Keyword(s):

Second Language ◽

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Learning Task ◽

Decision Task ◽

Decision Performance ◽

Distributional Learning ◽

The Relationship

Listening to speech entails adapting to vast amounts of variability in the signal. The present study examined the relationship between flexibility for adaptation in a second language (L2) and robustness of L2 phonolexical representations. Phonolexical encoding and phonetic flexibility for German learners of English were assessed by means of a lexical decision task containing nonwords with sound substitutions and a distributional learning task, respectively. Performance was analyzed for an easy (/i/-/ɪ/) and a difficult contrast (/ε/-/æ/, where /æ/ does not exist in German). Results showed that for /i/-/ɪ/ listeners were quite accurate in lexical decision, and distributional learning consistently triggered shifts in categorization. For /ε/-/æ/, lexical decision performance was poor but individual participants’ scores related to performance in distributional learning: the better learners were in their lexical decision, the smaller their categorization shift. This suggests that, for difficult L2 contrasts, rigidity at the phonetic level relates to better lexical performance.

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Evidence for Perceptual Defense Using a Lexical Decision Task

Perceptual and Motor Skills ◽

10.2466/pms.1980.50.1.195 ◽

1980 ◽

Vol 50 (1) ◽

pp. 195-198 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Leonard J. Williams ◽

James R. Evans

Keyword(s):

College Students ◽

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Response Bias ◽

Decision Task ◽

Taboo Words

In a tachistoscopic experiment employing a lexical-decision task, it was demonstrated that emotional (“taboo”) words are not responded to as quickly or as accurately as non-emotional (“neutral”) words by 32 college students. The results suggest evidence for “perceptual defense” uncontaminated by response bias.

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Effect of Emotions in a Lexical Decision Task

Swiss Journal of Psychology ◽

10.1024/1421-0185/a000193 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 76 (2) ◽

pp. 71-79 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Hélène Maire ◽

Renaud Brochard ◽

Jean-Luc Kop ◽

Vivien Dioux ◽

Daniel Zagar

Keyword(s):

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Emotional State ◽

Control Group ◽

Decision Task ◽

Attentional Orienting ◽

Emotional States ◽

Sequence Effect ◽

Emotion Induction ◽

Before And After

Abstract. This study measured the effect of emotional states on lexical decision task performance and investigated which underlying components (physiological, attentional orienting, executive, lexical, and/or strategic) are affected. We did this by assessing participants’ performance on a lexical decision task, which they completed before and after an emotional state induction task. The sequence effect, usually produced when participants repeat a task, was significantly smaller in participants who had received one of the three emotion inductions (happiness, sadness, embarrassment) than in control group participants (neutral induction). Using the diffusion model ( Ratcliff, 1978 ) to resolve the data into meaningful parameters that correspond to specific psychological components, we found that emotion induction only modulated the parameter reflecting the physiological and/or attentional orienting components, whereas the executive, lexical, and strategic components were not altered. These results suggest that emotional states have an impact on the low-level mechanisms underlying mental chronometric tasks.

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Are Emotions Abstract or Concrete?

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000374 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 64 (5) ◽

pp. 315-324 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Xu Xu ◽

Chunyan Kang ◽

Kaia Sword ◽

Taomei Guo

Keyword(s):

Lexical Decision ◽

Lexical Decision Task ◽

Well Being ◽

Event Related Potential ◽

Decision Task ◽

N400 Amplitude ◽

Abstract Nouns ◽

Concrete Nouns ◽

Emotion Concepts ◽

Healthy Participants

Abstract. The ability to identify and communicate emotions is essential to psychological well-being. Yet research focusing exclusively on emotion concepts has been limited. This study examined nouns that represent emotions (e.g., pleasure, guilt) in comparison to nouns that represent abstract (e.g., wisdom, failure) and concrete entities (e.g., flower, coffin). Twenty-five healthy participants completed a lexical decision task. Event-related potential (ERP) data showed that emotion nouns elicited less pronounced N400 than both abstract and concrete nouns. Further, N400 amplitude differences between emotion and concrete nouns were evident in both hemispheres, whereas the differences between emotion and abstract nouns had a left-lateralized distribution. These findings suggest representational distinctions, possibly in both verbal and imagery systems, between emotion concepts versus other concepts, implications of which for theories of affect representations and for research on affect disorders merit further investigation.

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