Negative priming from the non-selected meaning of the homograph

• Published in: The British journal of psychology Vol. 93; no. 1; pp. 47 - 66
• Main Authors: Nievas, Francisco, Marí-Beffa, Paloma
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01.02.2002; British Psychological Society; John Wiley & Sons, Inc
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Ambiguity; Analysis; Attention; Biological and medical sciences; Experiments; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Homographs; Humans; Inhibition; Inhibition (Psychology); Judgement; Language; Lexical decisions; Male; Meaning; Memory; Perception; Perception (Psychology); Priming; Production and perception of written language; Psychological aspects; Psychological research; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Reading; Semantic priming; Semantic Processing; Semantics; Task Performance and Analysis; United Kingdom; Human; Verbal comprehension; Reading; Language; Semantics; Priming effect; Homograph; Cognition; Inhibition; Experimental study; Negative priming; Ambiguity
• ISSN: 0007-1269; 2044-8295
• DOI: 10.1348/000712602162445

In this article we address the question of whether semantic ambiguity resolution involves the central inhibition of the non‐selected meaning of a homograph. Most previous studies on this topic have either not clearly required semantic selection, or have induced this disambiguation by manipulating the context. These studies have not observed clear inhibitory effects on the non‐selected meaning of the type studied in negative priming. We suggest that this kind of central inhibition may depend on task demands, and will be more easily observed in tasks where meaning selection is clearly required and is not made easier by cueing or context. In this study, participants had to perform a semantic judgment task in the prime display. Semantic priming from both the selected and the non‐selected meaning of homographs was measured by showing facilitation for the selected meaning and inhibitory effects of the non‐selected meaning. Participants with slow but accurate performance during the task were mainly responsible for this semantic negative priming effect, reflecting the role of inhibition on task‐oriented control. The ‘negative priming’ effect is discussed in relation to current theories of attentional selection.