Levels-of-processing effects on Chinese character completion: The importance of lexical processing and test cue

The levels of processing (LoP) effect was studied in Chinese character comp letion tasks. The same stem cue, either graphemically or semantically relat ed to the target character, was used to generate either a perceptual or a c onceptual test. Participants received either direct or indirect instruction s, so that the same stem cue also produced either an explicit or an implici t test of memory. This allowed us to examine simultaneously the roles of pe rceptual versus conceptual test and retrieval intentionality in the LoP eff ect. No LoP effects were found when the memory test was implicit. LoP effec ts were also not found for stems and characters related graphemically (perc eptually), but were found for stems and characters related semantically (co nceptually) when the memory test was explicit. The results are discussed in terms of the importance of lexical processing for character completion tes ts and the importance of reinstatement of the study process during retrieva l for explicit memory tests.