The SLIP Technique as a Window on the Mental Preparation of Speech: Some Methodological Considerations

Abstract

Abstract This chapter is about the so-called SLIP (Spoonerisms of Laboratory-Induced Predisposition) technique for eliciting spoonerisms. This technique was introduced in 1974 and has since been used by a number of researchers to study aspects of the mental production of speech. Recently the technique has seen a revival. A major question in many of the published studies is, ‘‘What is the cause of lexical bias?’’ Lexical bias is the phenomenon by which phonological speech errors more often lead to real words than to non-words, when a priori probabilities are equal. According to some, lexical bias is caused by feedback of activation between phonemes and words (Stemberger 1985; Dell 1986), whereas others claim that lexical bias is caused by selfmonitoring of inner speech rejecting and correcting non-words more often than real words (Levelt 1989; Levelt et al. 1999). This issue is important because it reflects two different ways of looking at the architecture of the mental processes involved in human speech production. Researchers in the feedback camp believe that, although one may distinguish between different hierarchically related components of the speech-production system, such as a component for retrieving and ordering lexical items and a component for retrieving and ordering phonemes, the hierarchical relation is only partial because there is interaction in the form of immediate feedback of activation between successive components.