title: The effect of grammatical gender and semantic context on lexical access in Italian using a timed word-naming paradigm.
abstract: The effects of sentence context and grammatical gender on lexical access were investigated in Italian using a timed word-naming paradigm. Large main effects of both sentence context and the gender of the article were observed; the interaction between gender and semantics was significant over subjects. Strong facilitation by both gender and semantics was observed, relative to a neutral-control baseline condition. Results are compared with (1) a prior study with the same design, using a picture-naming paradigm, except that objects described by written words were replaced by pictures (Bentrovato, Devescovi, D'Amico, & Bates, 1999); (2) a separate norming study of timed word reading in a list format, using the same stimuli (D'Amico, Devescovi, & Bates, 2001); and (3) a prior study of German comparing word and picture naming in short, semantically neutral phrases (Jacobsen, 1999). Differences in methodology and in findings between the Italian word naming and the German word naming are compared and discussed. Findings of the present study are interpreted in support of interactive-activation models in which different sources of information are combined on-line to predict, anticipate, or preactivate lexical targets.
authors.affiliation: Center for Research in Language 0526, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0526, USA. sbentrovato@crl.ucsd.edu
authors.forename: Simone
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bentrovato
authors.forename: Antonella
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Devescovi
authors.forename: Simona
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: D'Amico
authors.forename: Nicole
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Wicha
authors.forename: Elizabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Bates
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008037:Linguistics; D008297:Male; D011897:Random Allocation; D012660:Semantics; D013997:Time Factors; D014825:Vocabulary