title: Frequency and regularity effects in reading are task dependent: Evidence from ERPs.
abstract: Many theories of visual word processing assume obligatory semantic access and phonological recoding whenever a written word is encountered. However, the relative importance of different reading processes depends on task. The current study uses event related potentials (ERPs) to investigate whether - and, if so, when and how - effects of task modulate how visually-presented words are processed. Participants were presented written words in the context of two tasks, delayed reading aloud and proper name detection. Stimuli varied factorially on lexical frequency and on spellingto-sound regularity, while controlling for other lexical variables. Effects of both lexical frequency and regularity were modulated by task. Lexical frequency modulated N400 amplitude, but only in the reading aloud task, whereas spellingto-sound regularity interacted with frequency to modulate the LPC, again only in the reading aloud task. Taken together, these results demonstrate that task demands affect how meaning and sound are generated from written words.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Rice University.
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Fischer-Baum
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
authors.forename: Danielle S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Dickson
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign ; Program in Neuroscience, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign ; Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
authors.forename: Kara D
authors.initials: KD
authors.lastname: Federmeier
keywords: ERPs; Lexical Frequency; Spelling-to-sound regularity; task-dependent processing; visual word processing