Arithmetic tie problems like 6 + 6 or 7 X 7 can be solved much faster than
non-ties. The present article contrasts two possible explanations for the t
ie effect, faster encoding of tie problems vs. faster access to arithmetic
facts. For that purpose homogeneous (3 + 3, four X four) and heterogeneous
(3 + three, four X 4) addition and multiplication problems had to be solved
. For all participants the tie effect vanished with heterogeneous addition
problems and for seven out of eight subjects the effect disappeared with he
terogeneous multiplication problems. It is concluded that the tie effect is
mainly encoding-based. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.