Caffeine, priming, and tip of the tongue: evidence for plasticity in the phonological system.
A study was performed involving phonological priming and tip-of-the-tongue states (TOTs) in which participants took either 200 mg of caffeine or placebo. Results show a clear positive priming effect produced for the caffeine group when primed with phonologically related words. When primed with unrelated words, the caffeine subgroup produced a significant increase in the number of TOTs. This contrasting effect provides evidence that the positive priming of caffeine was not a result of caffeine's well-known alertness effects. For placebo, a significant negative effect occurred with the related-word priming condition. The results support the novel hypothesis that the blocking of A, adenosine receptors by caffeine induces an increased short-term plasticity effect within the phonological retrieval system.
Lesk
Valerie E
VE
Cognitive Neuroscience Sector, Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati, Via Beirut 2-4, 34014 Trieste, Italy. lesk@sissa.it
Womble
Stephen P
SP
D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D002110:Caffeine / Q000494:pharmacology*; D000697:Central Nervous System Stimulants / Q000494:pharmacology*; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D004311:Double-Blind Method; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000187:drug effects*; D010700:Phonetics; D011578:Psycholinguistics; D058915:Purinergic P1 Receptor Antagonists; D012660:Semantics; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000502:physiology
D000697:Central Nervous System Stimulants; D058915:Purinergic P1 Receptor Antagonists; D002110:Caffeine