Interaction entre lecture et mémoire : confrontation des modèles de lecture abstractif et épisodique à travers l'évolution de l'effet de longueur syllabique des pseudo-mots

National audienceÀ travers l'étude de la modulation de l'effet de longueur syllabique de mots et de pseudo-mots selon leur nombre de lecture, cette expérience évalue l'interaction entre les processus de lecture et les processus mnésiques. Les résultats montrent que l'effet de longueur syllabique, uniquement significatif pour les pseudo-mots lors de leur première présentation, disparaît dès la seconde présentation des items et ceci jusqu'à leur dernière présentation. Ces résultats suggèrent non seulement que la lecture reposerait sur un traitement global pour les mots et analytique pour les pseudo-mots, mais également qu'une seule présentation des pseudo-mots suffirait pour créer une trace mnésique permettant leur lecture ultérieure en procédure globale. Ces résultats sont difficilement interprétables dans le cadre d'un modèle de lecture à traitement en cascade (Coltheart, Rastle, Perry, Langdon, & Ziegler, 2001). En revanche, ils sont cohérents avec l'approche proposée par le modèle multi-traces de lecture ACV98 (Ans, Carbonnel, & Valdois, 1998), qui s'inscrit dans la lignée des théories épisodiques

Quantitative analysis of backchannels uttered by an interviewer during neuropsychological tests

International audienceThis paper examines in detail the backchannels uttered by a French professional interviewer during a neuropsychological test of verbal memories. These backchannels are short utterances such as oui, d'accord, uhm, etc. They are mainly produced here to encourage subjects to retrieve a set of words after their controlled encoding. We show that the choice of lexical items, their production rates and their associated prosodic contours are influenced by the subject performance and conditioned by the protocol

When the eyes no longer lead: familiarity and length effects on eye-voice span

During oral reading, the eyes tend to be ahead of the voice (eye-voice span, EVS). It has been hypothesized that the extent to which this happens depends on the automaticity of reading processes, namely on the speed of print-to-sound conversion. We tested whether EVS is affected by another automaticity component - immunity from interference. To that end, we manipulated word familiarity (high-frequency, low-frequency, and pseudowords, PW) and word length as proxies of immunity from interference, and we used linear mixed effects models to measure the effects of both variables on the time interval at which readers do parallel processing by gazing at word N + 1 while not having articulated word N yet (offset EVS). Parallel processing was enhanced by automaticity, as shown by familiarity x length interactions on offset EVS, and it was impeded by lack of automaticity, as shown by the transformation of offset EVS into voice eye span (voice ahead of the offset of the eyes) in PWs. The relation between parallel processing and automaticity was strengthened by the fact that offset EVS predicted reading velocity. Our findings contribute to understand how the offset EVS, an index that is obtained in oral reading, may tap into different components of automaticity that underlie reading ability, oral or silent. In addition, we compared the duration of the offset EVS with the average reference duration of stages in word production, and we saw that the offset EVS may accommodate for more than the articulatory programming stage of word N

Acquisition of Chinese characters: The effects of character properties and individual differences among second language learners

In light of the dramatic growth of Chinese learners worldwide and a need for cross-linguistic research on Chinese literacy development, this study drew upon theories of visual complexity effect (Su and Samuels, 2010) and dual-coding processing (Sadoski and Paivio, 2013) and investigated (a) the effects of character properties (i.e., visual complexity and radical presence) on character acquisition and (b) the relationship between individual learner differences in radical awareness and character acquisition. Participants included adolescent English-speaking beginning learners of Chinese in the U.S. Following Kuo et al. (2014), a novel character acquisition task was used to investigate the process of acquiring the meaning of new characters. Results showed that (a) characters with radicals and with less visual complexity were easier to acquire than characters without radicals and with greater visual complexity; and (b) individual differences in radical awareness were associated with the acquisition of all types of characters, but the association was more pronounced with the acquisition of characters with radicals. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings were discussed.The open access fee for this work was funded through the Texas A&M University Open Access to Knowledge (OAK) Fund

Length effect in naming and lexical decision: The multitrace memory model's account

15 pagesInternational audienceThrough the analysis of length effects (2-to-4 syllables) in reading aloud and lexical decision according to the nature of the items (words or pseudo-words), the present study aimed at investigating the nature of the cognitive procedures specifically involved in polysyllabic pseudo-word processing. The experimental findings revealed a length by lexicality interaction in reading but the absence of such interaction in lexical decision. Furthermore, the strong length effect found on pseudo-words in online naming vanished in delayed naming, so that it can not be interpreted as resulting from articulatory output generation. Similar effects were found through simulations conducted within the multitrace memory model of reading (Ans, Carbonnel & Valdois, 1998) suggesting that pseudo-word reading relies on an analytic procedure which does not apply in either word reading or lexical decision

Effet de longueur en lecture et en décision lexicale (études comportementales, imagerie fonctionnelle cérébrale et simulations )

CHAMBERY-BU Jacob (731372101) / SudocSudocFranceF

Phonological similarity in free and serial recall: The effect of increasing retention intervals

International audienceL'effet de similarité phonologique se manifeste par une performance de rappel plus faible lorsque les listes sont composées de mots dont la sonorité est proche que lorsque les mots sont de sonorité éloignée. Sur la base de la recherche de Nairne et Kelley (1999), nous nous sommes intéressés à la manière dont évolue cet effet classique de mémoire à court terme verbale dans le temps, c'est-à-dire à l'issue d'intervalles de rétention de durées variables. L'impact de la similarité phonologique sur la performance mnésique a été évaluée sur la base de trois paradigmes, la reconstruction de l'ordre, le rappel sériel et le rappel libre. Les participants ont été soumis à deux blocs de 15 listes comportant 5 mots monosyllabiques, un bloc comprenant des mots similaires phonologiquement et un bloc comprenant des mots dissimilaires phonologiquement. Le rappel est demandé après un intervalle de rétention d'une durée de 2, 8 ou 24 secondes durant lequel une tâche de shadowing de chiffres est proposée. Nos résultats confirment et étendent ceux obtenus par Nairne et Kelley. Pour les tâches de reconstruction de l'ordre et de rappel sériel, un effet de similarité phonologique classique (i.e., chute des performances pour les listes similaires) est observé avec un intervalle de rétention de 2 secondes. Cet effet disparaît après une courte période consacrée au shadowing de chiffres (i.e., 8 secondes) et un effet bénéfique de la similarité est observé pour un intervalle de rétention de 24 secondes. En rappel libre, la similarité phonologique provoque une amélioration des performances quel que soit le délai entre présentation et rappel. Ces résultats sont discutés à la lumière du modèle des traits de Nairne (1990a). Ils confirment le rôle des traitements spécifiques à l'item et des traitements inter-items lors de tâches telles que la reconstruction de l'ordre, le rappel sériel et libre

fMRI Evidence for ACV98 Connectionist Model for Reading of Mono and Multi-Syllabic Words and Pseudo-Words

According to predictions made by ACV98 connectionist model of reading, behavioral experiments have shown that syllabic length affects naming latencies for pseudo-words but not for words. ACV98 postulates the existence of two successive reading procedures. According to it, any orthographical object (word or pseudo-word) is first submitted to a global processing which aims to find a “lexical familiarity” computed from previously experienced words. If it is found, the corresponding phonological form of the stimulus is activated and reading is performed. If it is not found, a subsequent analytical processing is performed within the input stimulus using the same route, in order to extract familiar orthographic components (typically, syllables) as well as their corresponding phonological forms. The syllabic phonological forms are successively and temporarily maintained in a phonological buffer, before being assembled into a whole phonological form. Overall, this model predicts that words are read by using the global procedure, while the pseudo-words are read by using the analytical procedure. The present event-related fMRI study aimed to assess the effect of syllabic length on cerebral activity during reading, in order to obtain additional anatomo-functional information as support to this model as well as to behavioral results. Based on ACV98 predictions and in terms of cerebral network, we hypothesized (1) a lexicality effect: there should be no differences between words and pseudo-words, they are processed within a common network of cerebral regions, and (2) a syllable length effect: the length influences cerebral activity only during pseudo-words reading because only long pseudo-words are processed following an analytical procedure involving supplementary visual analysis, visuo-spatial attention and working memory processes. Eight right-handed volunteers performed a silent reading task on French printed words and pseudo-words. A pseudo-randomized event-related paradigm with 6 types (words=W and pseudo-words=PW composed of 1, 2 and 3 syllables) of stimuli was used. Data processing was performed using SPM'99. Our results have shown that (1) Words and pseudo-words involved common mechanisms such as visuo-orthographic, phonological, attentional and motor processes. No process was significantly more involved for one or the other of two types of stimuli (word or pseudo-word). This result is a priori more in agreement with “single way models” and particularly with ACV'98 than with dual-route models. Nonetheless the dual-route model cannot be excluded; (2) A length effect on cerebral activity was obtained only during pseudo-word reading suggesting an analytical procedure involvement during reading of long pseudo-words, as ACV'98 predicts

Evaluating fMRI methods for assessing hemispheric language dominance in healthy subjects.

International audienceWe evaluated two methods for quantifying the hemispheric language dominance in healthy subjects, by using a rhyme detection (deciding whether couple of words rhyme) and a word fluency (generating words starting with a given letter) task. One of methods called "flip method" (FM) was based on the direct statistical comparison between hemispheres' activity. The second one, the classical lateralization indices method (LIM), was based on calculating lateralization indices by taking into account the number of activated pixels within hemispheres. The main difference between methods is the statistical assessment of the inter-hemispheric difference: while FM shows if the difference between hemispheres' activity is statistically significant, LIM shows only that if there is a difference between hemispheres. The robustness of LIM and FM was assessed by calculating correlation coefficients between LIs obtained with each of these methods and manual lateralization indices MLI obtained with Edinburgh inventory. Our results showed significant correlation between LIs provided by each method and the MIL, suggesting that both methods are robust for quantifying hemispheric dominance for language in healthy subjects. In the present study we also evaluated the effect of spatial normalization, smoothing and "clustering" (NSC) on the intra-hemispheric location of activated regions and inter-hemispheric asymmetry of the activation. Our results have shown that NSC did not affect the hemispheric specialization but increased the value of the inter-hemispheric difference