EXPRESS: Remembering spatial words: Sensorimotor simulation affects verbal recognition memory

Previous evidence shows that words with implicit spatial meaning or metaphorical spatial associations are perceptually simulated and can guide attention to associated locations (e.g., bird – upward location). In turn, simulated representations interfere with visual perception at an associated location. The present study investigates the effect of spatial associations on short-term verbal recognition memory to disambiguate between modal and amodal accounts of spatial interference effects across two experiments. Participants in both experiments encoded words presented in congruent and incongruent locations. Congruent and incongruent locations were based on an independent norming task. In Experiment 1, an auditorily presented word probed participants’ memory as they were visually cued to either the original location of the probe word or a diagonal location at retrieval. In Experiment 2, there was no cue at retrieval but a neutral encoding condition in which words normed to central locations were shown. Results show that spatial associations affected memory performance although spatial information was neither relevant nor necessary for successful retrieval: Words in Experiment 1 were retrieved more accurately when there was a visual cue in the congruent location at retrieval but only if they were encoded in a non-canonical position. A visual cue in the congruent location slowed down memory performance when retrieving highly imageable words. With no cue at retrieval (Experiment 2), participants were better at remembering spatially congruent words as opposed to neutral words. Results provide evidence in support of sensorimotor simulation in verbal memory and a perceptual competition account of spatial interference effect.

Aging And Emotional Effects On Working Memory And Long-Term Memory For Target And Distracting Information

To resolve discrepancies between studies on the effects of emotional content on working memory, and to examine changes with age, this study examined the effects of emotional content on working memory and subsequent long-term memory for targets and distracters. Thirty-six younger (ages 18-29) and 36 older adults (ages 65-87) participated in a working memory task in which they viewed two target words intermixed with two distracters followed by a probe word, and responded to whether the probe was a target word. The emotional content (valence and arousal) of targets and distracters was manipulated. Subsequent long-term memory was tested with a free recall task. Results indicated that emotional content of targets facilitated working adults experiencing disruption from positive and neutral distracters, and older adults experiencing interference from negative distracters. Emotional effects in long-term memory were only seen for younger adults.

Aging And Emotional Effects On Working Memory And Long-Term Memory For Target And Distracting Information

To resolve discrepancies between studies on the effects of emotional content on working memory, and to examine changes with age, this study examined the effects of emotional content on working memory and subsequent long-term memory for targets and distracters. Thirty-six younger (ages 18-29) and 36 older adults (ages 65-87) participated in a working memory task in which they viewed two target words intermixed with two distracters followed by a probe word, and responded to whether the probe was a target word. The emotional content (valence and arousal) of targets and distracters was manipulated. Subsequent long-term memory was tested with a free recall task. Results indicated that emotional content of targets facilitated working adults experiencing disruption from positive and neutral distracters, and older adults experiencing interference from negative distracters. Emotional effects in long-term memory were only seen for younger adults.

Development and Validation of a Probe Word List to Assess Speech Motor Skills in Children

Purpose The aim of the study was to develop and validate a probe word list and scoring system to assess speech motor skills in preschool and school-age children with motor speech disorders. Method This article describes the development of a probe word list and scoring system using a modified word complexity measure and principles based on the hierarchical development of speech motor control known as the Motor Speech Hierarchy (MSH). The probe word list development accounted for factors related to word (i.e., motoric) complexity, linguistic variables, and content familiarity. The probe word list and scoring system was administered to 48 preschool and school-age children with moderate-to-severe speech motor delay at clinical centers in Ontario, Canada, and then evaluated for reliability and validity. Results One-way analyses of variance revealed that the motor complexity of the probe words increased significantly for each MSH stage, while no significant differences in the linguistic complexity were found for neighborhood density, mean biphone frequency, or log word frequency. The probe word list and scoring system yielded high reliability on measures of internal consistency and intrarater reliability. Interrater reliability indicated moderate agreement across the MSH stages, with the exception of MSH Stage V, which yielded substantial agreement. The probe word list and scoring system demonstrated high content, construct (unidimensionality, convergent validity, and discriminant validity), and criterion-related (concurrent and predictive) validity. Conclusions The probe word list and scoring system described in the current study provide a standardized method that speech-language pathologists can use in the assessment of speech motor control. It can support clinicians in identifying speech motor difficulties in preschool and school-age children, set appropriate goals, and potentially measure changes in these goals across time and/or after intervention.

Pupil Dilation Is Sensitive to Semantic Ambiguity and Acoustic Degradation

Speech comprehension is challenged by background noise, acoustic interference, and linguistic factors, such as the presence of words with more than one meaning (homonyms and homophones). Previous work suggests that homophony in spoken language increases cognitive demand. Here, we measured pupil dilation—a physiological index of cognitive demand—while listeners heard high-ambiguity sentences, containing words with more than one meaning, or well-matched low-ambiguity sentences without ambiguous words. This semantic-ambiguity manipulation was crossed with an acoustic manipulation in two experiments. In Experiment 1, sentences were masked with 30-talker babble at 0 and +6 dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), and in Experiment 2, sentences were heard with or without a pink noise masker at –2 dB SNR. Speech comprehension was measured by asking listeners to judge the semantic relatedness of a visual probe word to the previous sentence. In both experiments, comprehension was lower for high- than for low-ambiguity sentences when SNRs were low. Pupils dilated more when sentences included ambiguous words, even when no noise was added (Experiment 2). Pupil also dilated more when SNRs were low. The effect of masking was larger than the effect of ambiguity for performance and pupil responses. This work demonstrates that the presence of homophones, a condition that is ubiquitous in natural language, increases cognitive demand and reduces intelligibility of speech heard with a noisy background.

The cost of learning new meanings for familiar words

Research has shown that adults are highly skilled at learning new words and meanings. Here, we examined whether learning new meanings for familiar words affects the processing of their existing meanings. In Experiments 1 and 2, adult participants learnt new, fictitious meanings for previously unambiguous words (e.g., “sip” denoting a small amount of computer data) through four 30-minute training sessions completed over four consecutive days. We tested participants’ comprehension of existing meanings before and after training using a semantic relatedness decision task in which the probe word was related to the existing but not the new meaning of the trained word (e.g., “sip-juice”). Following the training, responses were slower to the trained, but not to the untrained, words, indicating competition between newly-acquired and well-established meanings. Furthermore, consistent with studies of semantic ambiguity, the effect was smaller for meanings that were semantically related to existing meanings than for the unrelated counterparts, demonstrating that meaning relatedness modulates the degree of competition. Overall, the key findings confirm that new word meanings can be integrated into the mental lexicon after just a few days’ exposure, and provide support for current models of ambiguity that predict semantic competition in word comprehension.

Multiple object categorization and effect of spatial frequencies

A process of interaction between objects and scene is widely investigated but much less attention is paid to the interaction between objects in multiple objects stimuli. In psychophysical experiment, we presented one, two, or three visual objects simultaneously for 100 ms and then asked subjects to answer whether objects belong to the same category (Experiments 1 and 2), or whether afterwards presented probe-word signify an object that was presented (Experiments 3 and 4). Interestingly, performance accuracy and reaction time did not depend on the number of objects if they belonged to the same category, but performance deteriorated when more categories were presented. Filtering out high or low spatial frequencies did not affect performance peculiarities of the objects of the same or different categories. The findings support assumption that visual objects of the same category could be identified simultaneously but the different categories are identified successively.

Multiple object categorization and effect of spatial frequencies

A process of interaction between objects and scene is widely investigated but much less attention is paid to the interaction between objects in multiple objects stimuli. In psychophysical experiment, we presented one, two, or three visual objects simultaneously for 100 ms and then asked subjects to answer whether objects belong to the same category (Experiments 1 and 2), or whether afterwards presented probe-word signify an object that was presented (Experiments 3 and 4). Interestingly, performance accuracy and reaction time did not depend on the number of objects if they belonged to the same category, but performance deteriorated when more categories were presented. Filtering out high or low spatial frequencies did not affect performance peculiarities of the objects of the same or different categories. The findings support assumption that visual objects of the same category could be identified simultaneously but the different categories are identified successively.

The Effects of Probe Similarity on Retrieval and Comparison Processes in Associative Recognition

In this study, we investigated the information processing stages underlying associative recognition. We recorded EEG data while participants performed a task that involved deciding whether a probe word triple matched any previously studied triple. We varied the similarity between probes and studied triples. According to a model of associative recognition developed in the Adaptive Control of Thought-Rational cognitive architecture, probe similarity affects the duration of the retrieval stage: Retrieval is fastest when the probe is similar to a studied triple. This effect may be obscured, however, by the duration of the comparison stage, which is fastest when the probe is not similar to the retrieved triple. Owing to the opposing effects of probe similarity on retrieval and comparison, overall RTs provide little information about each stage's duration. As such, we evaluated the model using a novel approach that decomposes the EEG signal into a sequence of latent states and provides information about the durations of the underlying information processing stages. The approach uses a hidden semi-Markov model to identify brief sinusoidal peaks (called bumps) that mark the onsets of distinct cognitive stages. The analysis confirmed that probe type has opposite effects on retrieval and comparison stages.