On processing Chinese ideographs and English words: Some implications from Stroop-test results

Biederman, Irving; Tsao, Yao-Chung

doi:10.1016/0010-0285(79)90007-0

Cited by 148 publications

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“…Alphabetic and logographic writing systems apparently activate different processing strategies, resulting in different visual encoding processes and subsequent memory codes. A similar suggestion has been raised by previous researchers of various topics: DIMENSIONS OF LEXICAL CODING 223 in writing systems and reading (Hung & Tzeng, in press), in visual half-field recognition studies (Sasanuma et al, 1977(Sasanuma et al, , 1980, in word recognition and recall (park & Arbuckle, 1977), in aphasia studies (Sasanuma, 1975), and in the Stroop effect (Biederman & Tsao, 1979). Furthermore, the present research demonstrated that visual representation plays a significant role in memory for Chinese logographs.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

“…Thus they allow relatively pure measurements of how the two subject groups use the visual similarity scale, and they enable a method of adjusting subjects' performance on the verbal stimuli in order to make appropriate crosscultural group comparisons. (A similar technique was used by Biederman and Tsao, 1979.) The adjusted scale values then can be used to judge whether we have succeeded in matching the degree of visual similarity and graphemic-phonemic confounding in Chinese and English stimulus pairs.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Thus, Park and Arbuckle (1977) concluded that memory processes can be affected by the writing system in which the words are presented. Recently, Biederman and Tsao (1979) found that the magnitude of the Stroop interference effect (Le., the interference found in naming a colored ink when it is used to spell the name of a conflicting color) is much greater in the Chinese version with Chinese subjects than in the English version with American subjects. They concluded that "a reader of English cannot refrain from applying an abstract rule system to the word; a reader of Chinese may not be able to refrain from configurational processing of the ideography" (Biederman & Tsao, 1979, p. 131).…”

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Dimensions of lexical coding in Chinese and English

Chen

Juola

1982

Memory & Cognition

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Phonology and orthography are closely related in some languages, such as English, and they are nearly unrelated in others, such as Chinese. The effects of these differences were assessed in a study of the roles of phonemic, graphemic, and semantic information on lexical coding and memory for Chinese logographs and English words. Some of the stimuli in the two languages were selected such that the natural confounding between phonemic and graphemic information in English was matched in the set of Chinese words used. An initial scaling study indicated that this attempt to equate degree of phonemic-graphemic confounding was successful. A second experiment used a recognition memory task for English and Chinese words with separate subject groups of native speakers of the two languages. Subjects were to select one of a pair of test words that was phonemically, graphemically, or semantically similar to a word on a previously studied list. Differences in the dimensions of lexical coding in memory were demonstrated in significant Stimulus Type by Decision Type interactions in the recognition data. Chinesespeaking subjects responded most rapidly and accurately in the graphemic recognition task, whereas performance was generally equivalent in all three tasks for the English-speaking subjects. Alphabetic and logographic writing systems apparently activate different coding and memory mechanisms such that logographic characters produce significantly more visual information in memory, whereas alphabetic words result in a more integrated code involving visual, phonological, and semantic information.Cognitive psychologists have long been interested in how variations in the format of visual stimulation result in changes in information processing strategies. The question has been viewed from several different perspectives; consequently, a number of related questions have been formed. For example, are words and pictures recognized by different cognitive mechanisms? Do different writing systems require different processing strategies for comprehension? It has been known for a long time that memory capacity is greater for pictures than for words (Haber, 1970;Shepard, 1967;Standing, 1973), which has led to suggestions that pictures and words are coded differently in memory. On the other hand, the effect of orthographic variation on memory coding has not been extensively investigated. Thus, the primary concern of the present study is the effect of different systems of writing on visual coding and memory mechanisms.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

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Dimensions of lexical coding in Chinese and English

Chen

Juola

1982

Memory & Cognition

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“…ence effect to be stronger for Chinese than for English readers (Biedermann & Tsao, 1979;Lee & Chan, 2000). The Stroop task requires respondents to name the print color of a presented word rather than merely read this word.…”

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Differences between Chinese morphosyllabic and German alphabetic readers in the Stroop interference effect

Saalbach

Stern

2004

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

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“…This question has been investigated by many researchers, using a variety of semantic tasks (see, e.g., Snodgrass, 1984, for a relevant review). These have included, for example, bilingual naming and translation (e.g., Chen & Leung, 1989;Kroll & Curley, 1987;Potter, So, Von Eckardt, & Feldman, 1984), the semantic/sentence priming paradigm with a lexical decision task (e.g., Chen & Ng, 1989; Jin & Fischler, 1987; Kirsner, Smith, Lockhart, King, & Jain, 1984;Kroll & Borning, 1987;Schwanenflugel & Rey, 1986), and the Stroop type of interference task (e.g., Biederman & Tsao, 1979;Chen & Ho, 1986). The results of these studies with proficient, bilingual subjects are generally consistent with the concept-mediation hypothesis that the native and non-native languages of a proficient bilingual are operated independently, so that lexical items in the This research was supported by a Faculty Research Grant from The Chinese University of Hong Kong.…”

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Lexical processing in a non-native language: Effects of language proficiency and learning strategy

Chen

1990

Memory & Cognition

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In three experiments, native Chinese speakers were asked to use their native and non-native languages to read and translate Chinese words and to name pictures. In Experiment 1, four groups of subjects with various degrees of proficiency in their second language, English, participated. In Experiments 2 and 3, subjects were first asked to learn a list of words in a new language, French, using either Chinese words or pictures as media; then they performed the reading, naming, and translation tasks. All subjects performed better in reading words than in naming pictures, when responding in Chinese. When the response was in the non-native language (English or French), high-learning subjects were equally efficient in translation and picture-naming tasks. Low-learning subjects, however, performed better in either the translation or the picture-naming task, depending on their learning strategies. These results are consistent with the idea that both proficiency in a non-native language and the strategy for acquiring the language are main determinants for the pattern of lexical processing in that language.One important question in the study of bilingual or multilingual processing concerns how people process words in their non-native language. This question has been investigated by many researchers, using a variety of semantic tasks (see, e.g., Snodgrass, 1984, for a relevant review). These have included, for example, bilingual naming and translation (e.g., Chen & Leung, 1989;Kroll & Curley, 1987;Potter, So, Von Eckardt, & Feldman, 1984), the semantic/sentence priming paradigm with a lexical decision task (e.g., Chen & Ng, 1989; Jin & Fischler, 1987; Kirsner, Smith, Lockhart, King, & Jain, 1984;Kroll & Borning, 1987;Schwanenflugel & Rey, 1986), and the Stroop type of interference task (e.g., Biederman & Tsao, 1979;Chen & Ho, 1986). The results of these studies with proficient, bilingual subjects are generally consistent with the concept-mediation hypothesis that the native and non-native languages of a proficient bilingual are operated independently, so that lexical items in the This research was supported by a Faculty Research Grant from The Chinese University of Hong Kong. This article was prepared while the author was a Research Fellow at the Institute for Perception Research (IPO), and the recipient of a research fellowship from the Eindhoven University of Technology, the Netherlands. I am grateful to the principal, Chun Ping Ng, and the students of the Po Leung Kuk Siu HonSum Primary Schoolfor their kind assistance and participation; to YuenSum Leung, Siu-Yee Mak, Kin-TongChan, Siu-Yee Wong, and FungYing Siu for assistancein conductingthe experiments; and to MaryPotter, Annette de Groot, James Chumbley, and an anonymous reviewer for helpful comments and suggestions on an earlier draft. Correspondence should be addressed to Hsuan-Chih Chen, Department of Psychology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, NT, Hong Kong. two languages are not directly associated but are connected through an amodal conceptual system ...

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On processing Chinese ideographs and English words: Some implications from Stroop-test results

Cited by 148 publications

References 14 publications

Dimensions of lexical coding in Chinese and English

Dimensions of lexical coding in Chinese and English

Differences between Chinese morphosyllabic and German alphabetic readers in the Stroop interference effect

Lexical processing in a non-native language: Effects of language proficiency and learning strategy

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