Abstract
Speakers' memory of sentence structure can persist and modulate the syntactic choices of subsequent utterances (i.e., structural priming). Much research on structural priming posited a multifactorial account by which an implicit learning process and a process related to explicit memory jointly contribute to the priming effect. Here, we tested two predictions from that account: (1) that lexical repetition facilitates the retrieval of sentence structures from memory; (2) that priming is partly driven by a short-term explicit memory mechanism with limited resources. In two pairs of structural priming and sentence structure memory experiments, we examined the effects of structural priming and its modulation by lexical repetition as a function of cognitive load in native Dutch speakers. Cognitive load was manipulated by interspersing the prime and target trials with easy or difficult mathematical problems. Lexical repetition boosted both structural priming (Experiments 1a-2a) and memory for sentence structure (Experiments 1b-2b) and did so with a comparable magnitude. In Experiment 1, there were no load effects, but in Experiment 2, with a stronger manipulation of load, both the priming and memory effects were reduced with a larger cognitive load. The findings support an explicit memory mechanism in structural priming that is cue-dependent and attention-demanding, consistent with a multifactorial account of structural priming.
Highlights
A central issue of language production is the role of working memory in the production processes
The average time occupied by problem solving in the Easy Problem condition was 1311 ms shorter than the average time of problem solving in the Difficult Problem condition (Easy: 1548 ms vs. Difficult: 2851 ms, Cohen’s d = -3.085), indicating an evident distinction of cognitive load between the two difficulty levels of the secondary task
The comparable lexical overlap effect between structural priming and sentence structure memory supports the prediction from the multifactorial account that the lexical boost effect is driven by a short-term explicit memory mechanism that can be magnified by lexical cueing
Summary
A central issue of language production is the role of working memory in the production processes. Speaking often proceeds at a fast rate, suggestive of a view by which speakers do not always need working memory to control the formulation of utterances. In his classic book Speaking, Levelt [1] argued that other than in determining the message that speakers intend to utter, most of the processes involved in speaking function “in a reflex-like, automatic way”. Speakers do sometimes show limited memory capacity in stages later than message planning.
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