Orthographic, Lexical and Semantic Processing

当今许多熟练阅读理论的一个原则是，单词识别是一个竞争过程。具体来说，基本的假设是，当一个单词被固定时，一个正字法代码被创建，代表单词中的字母及其出现的顺序。然后，该代码不仅激活了所呈现单词的心理（“词汇”）表征，还激活了类似拼写单词的心理（“词汇”）表征。然后，这些表征相互竞争，直到通常情况下，合适单词的心理表征最终赢得竞争（即保持活跃），而不合适单词的表征被抑制。这个建议的目的是继续我对合适的单词赢得这场比赛的过程的研究，这个过程使读者能够理解被阅读的单词。一个主要问题是如何描述正字法编码过程。现在清楚的是，至少部分被任何特定的正字法编码激活的具有表征的单词集是广泛的。例如，尽管“avacitno”和“vacation”的正字法代码在相同的位置上没有字母，但我们的数据显示，读取字母字符串“avacitno”会创建一个正字法代码，激活单词“vacation”的词法表示，这表明这两个正字法代码一定有些相似。（注意，“avacitno”和“vacation”确实包含相同的一组字母，尽管它们在两个字母字符串中的位置不同。）因此，一个关键问题是如何以一种反映这种相似性的方式来表征正字法编码的本质。第二个关键问题是如何描述词汇选择过程，即正确的单词在竞争中获胜的过程。第三个关键问题是理解这种激活/竞争过程如何影响记忆中语义（即意义）信息的激活，这些信息使单词的意思能够被理解。***检查这些问题的方法包括在电脑屏幕上呈现单个单词或非单词（“目标”），然后是单词或非单词“启动”，这些单词或非单词“启动”被简短地呈现并掩盖，这样它们就不会达到意识。当读者对目标进行公开回应时，他们要么将目标分类为单词或非单词，要么回答“是”或“否”，以判断它们是否符合某些预先指定的标准（例如，呈现的单词是单词WATCH吗？），或者这个词是动物的名字？)。通过更好地理解正字法编码的本质和读者心理词汇中表征之间的竞争/激活过程，我们希望为以下方面的理解奠定更好的基础：a)成人的正常阅读；b)如何最好地教儿童阅读；c)如何纠正阅读障碍者的阅读困难

One principle of many present day theories of skilled reading is that word identification is a competitive process. Specifically, the basic set of assumptions is that when a word is fixated, an orthographic code is created representing the letters in the word and the order in which they occur. That code then activates the mental (“lexical”) representation of not only the presented word but also those of similarly spelled words. Those representations then compete with one another until, typically, the mental representation of the appropriate word eventually wins the competition (i.e., remains active) with the representations of the inappropriate words being inhibited. *** The purpose of this proposal is to continue my examination of the processes by which the appropriate word wins this competition, the processes allowing the reader to gain an understanding of the word being read. One major question is how to characterize the orthographic coding process. What is now clear is that the set of words with representations that are at least partially activated by any particular orthographic code is extensive. For example, although the orthographic codes of "avacitno" and "vacation" have no letters in the same positions, our data show that reading the letter string "avactino" creates an orthographic code that activates the lexical representation for the word "vacation", indicating that the two orthographic codes must be somewhat similar. (Note that "avacitno" and "vacation" do contain the same set of letters even though they are in different positions in the two letter strings.) One key issue, therefore, is how to characterize the nature of orthographic coding in a way that reflects this similarity. A second key issue is how to characterize the lexical selection process, that is, the process by which the correct word wins the competition. A third key issue is understanding how this activation/competition process affects the activation of semantic (i.e., meaning) information in memory, information that allows the word's meaning to be understood.*** The means of examining these issues involves presenting single words or nonwords ("targets") on a computer screen following word or nonword "primes" which are presented briefly and masked so that they do not reach consciousness. Readers are timed while they overtly respond to the targets either by classifying them as words or nonwords or by responding "yes" or "no" as to whether they match some pre-specified criterion (e.g., is the presented word the word WATCH?, or is the presented word the name of an animal?). By gaining a better understanding of the nature of orthographic coding and of the competition/activation processes among representations in the reader's mental lexicon, we hope to obtain a better foundation for understanding: a) normal reading in adults, b) how best to teach children to read and c) how to remediate reading difficulties in reading disabled individuals.**