On the interaction between linguistic and pictorial systems in the absenceof semantic mediation: Evidence from a priming paradigm

Use of the letter search task in the context of the priming paradigm has pr oved to be an invaluable tool for the investigation of the strategic contro l of processes involved in word recognition. In particular, previous findin gs that letter search on a prime word interferes with the priming of semant ically/associatively related targets, but not with the priming of either id entical or morphologically related targets, suggests that letter search may selectively interfere with semantic processing, leaving other levels of pr ocessing intact. In the present experiments, this investigation was extende d by exploring the priming of pictures following letter search of either a same-concept word (repetition priming) or a semantically/associatively rela ted word (semantic priming). There was significant repetition priming of pi cture categorization following both silent reading and letter search of the prime word (Experiments 1 and 2). In contrast, semantic priming of picture s was found only following silent reading of the prime; there was no semant ic priming following letter search of the prime (Experiment 2). This patter n of results suggests that focusing attention at the letter level during pr ime processing selectively attenuates activation of the semantic system by the prime. It does not prevent the spread of activation between the lexical and pictogen levels of representation of a given concept.