Abstracts of the Psychonomic Society — Volume 14 — November ...

Friday Morning Papers 22–27
We present research that focuses on language learning and inhibition
in English monolinguals and English–Spanish bilinguals. First, monolinguals
and bilinguals were taught artificially constructed words that
overlapped with English orthographically but diverged phonologically.
Native-language orthographic information presented during learning
interfered with encoding of novel words in monolinguals but not in
bilinguals. Next, monolinguals and bilinguals learned artificially constructed
words that shared English phonology. While using the newly
learned vocabulary, coactivation and inhibition of English were tested
via eyetracking and mousetracking. The results suggest that bilinguals
outperform monolinguals on novel word learning and recruit inhibitory
control differently while processing language. These findings extend
research on coactivation and inhibition in fluent bilinguals to new language
learners and suggest that bilingualism changes how the cognitive
system responds to linguistic input.
Discourse Processing
Back Bay Ballroom C, Friday Morning, 8:00–9:15
Chaired by Gabriel A. Radvansky, University of Notre Dame
8:00–8:15 (22)
Aging and Mind Wandering. GABRIEL A. RADVANSKY, SABINE A.
KRAWIETZ, & ANDREA K. TAMPLIN, University of Notre Dame—
Younger and older adults were asked to read the first five chapters of
Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. At various intervals (randomly sampled
every 2–4 min), the participants were probed to assess whether they were
mind wandering and to assess whether they could answer recognition
questions. The results of this paradigm revealed that older adults mind
wandered less often than the younger adults and were more accurate at
answering the questions. These results are interpreted in light of current
theories of mind wandering and situation model processing and aging.
Specifically, older adults have less working memory capacity and, therefore,
have fewer resources to allow mind wandering to occur. Also, superior
processing at the situation model level allows older adults to better
engage in what they are reading, leading to less mind wandering.
8:20–8:35 (23)
Establishing Global and Local Coherence in Discourse Processing:
Evidence From fMRI. PAUL va n den BROEK, Leiden University, BEN
SEIPEL & VIRGINIA CLINTON, University of Minnesota, EDWARD J.
O’BRIEN, University of New Hamsphire, PHILIP BURTON, University
of Minnesota, & NICOLE LANDI, Yale University and Haskins Laboratories—Maintaining
both global and local text coherence is critical for
successful reading comprehension. The present study used event-related
fMRI to compare patterns of brain activation associated with reading
narrative texts that were consistent relative to those that were inconsistent
at either the global or the local level. Global inconsistencies evoked
increased activation in the prefrontal cortex along the midline, an area
associated in prior research with monitoring character motivation and
action, as well as with conflict resolution. Local inconsistencies evoked
increased activation in the precuneus. These results indicate that reading
inconsistent (as compared with consistent) texts elicits unique neural patterns
and, moreover, that these neural activations are distinct for global
versus local inconsistencies. The results also suggest that readers engage
in different cognitive processes for building a mental representation at the
local and global text levels, respectively.
8:40–8:55 (24)
Regulatory Focus and the Accessibility of Goals During Reading.
DAVID B. MIELE, Columbia University, & DAVID N. RAPP, Northwestern
University (read by David N. Rapp)—A large body of work
has demonstrated that information about a protagonist’s goals is highly
accessible to readers while those goals remain unsatisfied; in contrast,
this information becomes less accessible once the goals have been satisfied
(perhaps as a function of the decreased importance or relevance of
satisfied goals). Notably, the accessibility of everyday goal information
appears to depend on whether an individual is predominantly focused on
promotion or prevention concerns (i.e., seeking opportunities for gain vs.
4
protecting against losses). The present project examined whether these
regulatory concerns impact the accessibility of goals during text experiences.
Participants read stories in which protagonists satisfied goals
or postponed their completion. After each story, participants indicated
whether a test statement matched the protagonist’s goal. Promotionfocused
participants exhibited the standard pattern, with slower judgments
to goal statements when the goal was satisfied than when it was
unsatisfied; however, prevention-focused participants did not exhibit
similar declines in judgment latencies for satisfied goals.
9:00–9:15 (25)
Does Rapid Talk Impose a Cost or a Benefit in the Referential Communication
Task? CLAUDE G. ČECH & KYLE E. ALBARADO,
University of Louisiana, Lafayette—In one version of the referential
communication task, directors describe tangram figures with the goal of
enabling matchers to select and arrange their figures in the same order.
Fox Tree (1999) found that overhearers listening to tapes of interactive
directors and matchers placed more figures correctly, despite the
fact that rate of speech was slower in the monologue condition, thereby
presumably facilitating comprehension. She thus concluded that better
performance was moderated by factors (e.g., multiple perspectives,
discourse markers) other than speech rate. We explored an alternative
claim that faster (but still normal) rates of speech may engage enhanced
attentional processing, thereby partly accounting for the dialogue superiority
effect. To test this claim, we looked at the effect of speech rate on
accuracy within monologue and dialogue conditions.
Associative Learning
Back Bay Ballroom D, Friday Morning, 8:00–9:35
Chaired by Russell M. Church, Brown University
8:00–8:15 (26)
Memorization or Rapid Relearning in a Multiple-Cued-Interval
Task. PAULO GUILHARDI, Brown University and New England Center
for Children, MARCELO S. CAETANO, Brown University and
The John B. Pierce Laboratory, & RUSSELL M. CHURCH, Brown
University (read by Russell M. Church)—The problem was to identify
training conditions under which temporal intervals, signaled by different
stimuli, are memorized (i.e., under stimulus control) or rapidly
relearned. The task was a simple computer game in which a participant
shot at a moving target, with feedback regarding hits and misses; this
was a relatively engaging multiple-cued-interval task. The conditions
were variations in the speed of the target, the discriminability of the
stimuli, whether or not the target was visible, and the order of presentation
of the types of trials. The participants readily learned the
multiple-cued-interval task. The results were generally consistent with
the principles of scalar timing and with a modular process model of
timing. Although responding was similar across conditions at the end
of training, transfer tests demonstrated that the resulting intervening
processes differed. The results with human participants were similar to
those observed with rats.
8:20–8:35 (27)
Putting Names to Unfamiliar Faces: Similarity in Face–Name Associative
Learning. ROBERT SEKULER & JIE HUANG, Brandeis
University, & MICHAEL J. KAHANA, University of Pennsylvania—
How does perceptual similarity influence the learning of face–name
associations? For answers, we used realistic synthetic faces and monosyllabic
Chinese names. The stimuli’s perceptual similarity spaces were
defined by multidimensional scaling. Then associative recognition was
measured with stimulus sets whose similarities were manipulated parametrically.
In alternating study and test blocks, subjects studied a fixed
set of face–name pairs and were tested with preserved and rearranged
pairs. Over successive trial blocks, correct recognitions of preserved
face–name pairs increased, whereas false recognitions of rearranged
pairs decreased. Face and name similarity each strongly influenced associative
recognition. These similarity effects were accommodated within
a novel, hybrid model in which an interactive activation and competition