Comments on the interpretation of lateral asymmetries in the naming of words and line drawings.
Young, Bion, and Ellis (Brain and Language, 11, 54-65, 1980) found no visual hemifield differences for right-handed subjects' first reports of bilaterally presented picturable nouns and line drawings, and small RVF superiorities for second reports of these stimuli. Levine and Banich (1982), however, found no visual hemifield differences for line drawings, and a substantial RVF superiority for picturable words. Two procedural factors are identified as responsible for this difference in results; namely the lack of control of order of report in Levine and Banich's (1982) study, and their use of vertically aligned words. Levine and Banich's (1982) attempt to explain findings of side of presentation X report interactions in terms of directional scanning and reporting preferences is shown to be untenable. Explanations in terms of cerebral asymmetries are more convincing, but they must be related to explicit theoretical models.
D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology*; D011601:Psychophysics; D011932:Reading; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D014794:Visual Fields; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*