title: Activation of syllable units during visual recognition of French words in Grade 2.
abstract: ABSTRACTThe aim of the study was to investigate the syllable activation hypothesis in French beginning readers. Second graders performed a lexical decision task in which bisyllabic words were presented in two colours that either matched the syllable boundaries or not. The data showed that the children were sensitive to syllable match and to syllable complexity. In addition, good readers were slowed down while poor readers were speeded up by syllable match. These findings suggest that syllables are functional units of lexical access in children and that syllable activation is influenced by reading level.
authors.affiliation: Université Bordeaux 2, Bordeaux, Bordeaux cedex, France. fabienne.chetail@u-bordeaux2.fr
authors.forename: Fabienne
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Chetail
authors.forename: Stephanie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mathey
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D002663:Child Language; D003116:Color; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007807:Language Tests; D010700:Phonetics; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time; D011932:Reading; D014796:Visual Perception