Word recognition in early reading: A review of the direct and indirect access hypotheses

Abstract

Research on the development of word recognition, like that on fluent word recognition, has been strongly influenced by the dual-route model. One route is non-lexical and indirect because access to lexical meaning is mediated by pre-lexical phonological representations assembled through the application of grapheme-to-phoneme correspondence (GPC) rules. The other route, which is independent of the first, is regarded as lexical and direct because orthographic representations of whole words are used to retrieve lexical meanings or post-lexical phonological representations. Evidence is reviewed for two opposing developmental hypotheses based on the dual-route model: fluent readers use both direct and indirect access to lexical meaning, while beginning readers use (1) only indirect access or (2) only direct access. It was concluded that neither mode of access predominates in early reading. A review of other evidence suggests two reasons why the dual-route model fails to provide a satisfactory account of the development of early word recognition. First, it does not offer an adequate characterization of the orthographic units represented in early lexicons. Second, the independence of the two routes prevents lexical information from being acquired through the application of GPC rules. Finally, alternatives to the dual-route model are discussed. One of the most promising is a single process lexical model in which it is proposed that acquisition and performance in word recognition can be accounted for by interactions among orthographic and phonological units of various sizes in the lexicon.