AUDITORY PROCESSING OF PREFIXED ENGLISH WORDS IS BOTH CONTINUOUS AND DECOMPOSITIONAL

Two experiments compared continuous and discontinuous models of word r ecognition. Participants heard prefixed words whose full-form and root uniqueness points (Ups) differed, in either a gating or lexical decis ion paradigm. Identification points and reaction times were analyzed u sing multiple regression. Full-form UPs predicted performance better t han root UPs did. Full-form frequency measures had reliable facilitati ve relationships with performance while root frequency measures were n ot consistently significant. Prefix frequency had a reliable, inhibito ry effect. Judged prefixedness, semantic transparency, and prefix like lihood were related to performance? alone or in interaction. The resul ts provide evidence for both kinds of word recognition procedures. A m odel is proposed with two parallel recognition routines: a whole-word routine and a decompositional routine that considers only unbound root s that can combine with the prefix in question. A preliminary rating s tudy provides stimulus values on several dimensions and can be used as a database by other researchers. (C) 1997 Academic Press.