Abstract
We investigated the role of lexical syntactic information such as grammatical gender and category in spoken word retrieval processes by using a blocking paradigm in picture and written word naming experiments. In Experiments 1, 3, and 4, we found that the naming of target words (nouns) from pictures or written words was faster when these target words were named within a list where only words from the same grammatical category had to be produced (homogeneous category list: all nouns) than when they had to be produced within a list comprising also words from another grammatical category (heterogeneous category list: nouns and verbs). On the other hand, we detected no significant facilitation effect when the target words had to be named within a homogeneous gender list (all masculine nouns) compared to a heterogeneous gender list (both masculine and feminine nouns). In Experiment 2, using the same blocking paradigm by manipulating the semantic category of the items, we found that naming latencies were significantly slower in the semantic category homogeneous in comparison with the semantic category heterogeneous condition. Thus semantic category homogeneity caused an interference, not a facilitation effect like grammatical category homogeneity. Finally, in Experiment 5, nouns in the heterogeneous category condition had to be named just after a verb (category-switching position) or a noun (same-category position). We found a facilitation effect of category homogeneity but no significant effect of position, which showed that the effect of category homogeneity found in Experiments 1, 3, and 4 was not due to a cost of switching between grammatical categories in the heterogeneous grammatical category list. These findings supported the hypothesis that grammatical category information impacts word retrieval processes in speech production, even when words are to be produced in isolation. They are discussed within the context of extant theories of lexical production.
Highlights
Lexical knowledge required for the appropriate use of words in connected speech includes knowledge of the words’ semantic, syntactic, and phonological properties
This finding made it very unlikely that the facilitation effect observed in the grammatical homogeneous (HOM) condition compared to the grammatical heterogeneous (HeCAT) condition in Experiment 1 had a semantic locus, i.e., that it was due to the grammatical homogeneous list comprising items from the same semantic class (i.e., “objects”)
The important result is that the facilitation effect produced by grammatical homogeneity was effective and large enough to outweigh the possible interference effect produced by semantic homogeneity
Summary
Lexical knowledge required for the appropriate use of words in connected speech includes knowledge of the words’ semantic, syntactic, and phonological properties. In current theories of representation and access to lexical knowledge in speech production (e.g., Roelofs, 1992; Caramazza, 1997; Levelt et al, 1999), it is assumed that these three aspects of lexical knowledge are represented at three independent levels within the word production system and accessed in two steps: first, a lexical unit, corresponding to a lexical node within a network model, is activated on the basis of the semantic properties of the target word; the lexical node spreads its activation independently to phoneme nodes, on the one hand, and to syntactic nodes, on the other hand, allowing the independent retrieval of the word’s phonological content and syntactic features such as grammatical category and gender, respectively.
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
