title: Mediated and convergent lexical priming in language production: a comment on Levelt et al. (1991).
abstract: Levelt et al. (1991) argued that modular semantic and phonological stage theories of lexical access in language production are to be preferred over interactive spreading-activation theories (e.g., Dell, 1986). As evidence, they show no mediated semantic-phonological priming during picture naming: Retrieval of sheep primes goat, but the activation of goat is not transmitted to its phonological relative, goal. This research reconciles this result with spreading-activation theories and shows how the absence of mediated priming coexists with the convergent priming necessary to account for mixed semantic-phonological speech errors. The analysis leads to the proposal that the language-production system may best be characterized as globally modular but locally interactive.
authors.affiliation: Beckman Institute, University of Illinois, Urbana 61801.
authors.forename: G S
authors.initials: GS
authors.lastname: Dell
authors.forename: P G
authors.initials: PG
authors.lastname: O'Seaghdha
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D006801:Humans; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D010700:Phonetics; D011578:Psycholinguistics; D012660:Semantics; D013067:Speech Perception; D014705:Verbal Behavior