Abstract:
Spoken words are easier to identify if they have been heard recently. This phenomenon, known as repetition priming, can be used to investigate the processes underlying word recognition. Using an implicit memory paradigm, this study looked at the effect of changing the voice of the speaker on repetition priming. Voice effects occur if repetition priming is reduced when a spoken word has been heard in different voices at study and test. Voice effects have been found in implicit memory tasks, such as word identification and word-stem completion [B. A. Church and D. L. Schacter, JEP:LMC 20, 521--533 (1994); S. D. Goldinger, doctoral dissertation, 1992]. This study investigated if these results could be generalized to other implicit memory tasks---specifically, lexical decision, naming, and a new task, auditory fragment completion. No voice effects were found with any of these three tasks. These results are problematic for current accounts of word recognition and imply that as yet unidentified factors control the occurrence of voice effects.