TY - JOUR
T1 - When benefits outweigh costs
T2 - Reconsidering "automatic" phonological recoding when reading aloud
AU - Robidoux, Serje
AU - Besner, Derek
PY - 2011/6
Y1 - 2011/6
N2 - Skilled readers are slower to read aloud exception words (e.g., PINT) than regular words (e.g., MINT). In the case of exception words, sublexical knowledge competes with the correct pronunciation driven by lexical knowledge, whereas no such competition occurs for regular words. The dominant view is that the cost of this "regularity" effect is evidence that sublexical spelling-sound conversion is impossible to prevent (i.e., is "automatic"). This view has become so reified that the field rarely questions it. However, the results of simulations from the most successful computational models on the table suggest that the claim of "automatic" sublexical phonological recoding is premature given that there is also a benefit conferred by sublexical processing. Taken together with evidence from skilled readers that sublexical phonological recoding can be stopped, we suggest that the field is too narrowly focused when it asserts that sublexical phonological recoding is "automatic" and that a broader, more nuanced and contextually driven approach provides a more useful framework.
AB - Skilled readers are slower to read aloud exception words (e.g., PINT) than regular words (e.g., MINT). In the case of exception words, sublexical knowledge competes with the correct pronunciation driven by lexical knowledge, whereas no such competition occurs for regular words. The dominant view is that the cost of this "regularity" effect is evidence that sublexical spelling-sound conversion is impossible to prevent (i.e., is "automatic"). This view has become so reified that the field rarely questions it. However, the results of simulations from the most successful computational models on the table suggest that the claim of "automatic" sublexical phonological recoding is premature given that there is also a benefit conferred by sublexical processing. Taken together with evidence from skilled readers that sublexical phonological recoding can be stopped, we suggest that the field is too narrowly focused when it asserts that sublexical phonological recoding is "automatic" and that a broader, more nuanced and contextually driven approach provides a more useful framework.
KW - Automaticity
KW - Computational models
KW - Phonological recoding
KW - Reading aloud
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=80053410866&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1037/a0021642
DO - 10.1037/a0021642
M3 - Article
C2 - 21668092
AN - SCOPUS:80053410866
VL - 65
SP - 105
EP - 108
JO - Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology
JF - Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology
SN - 1196-1961
IS - 2
ER -