See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/232543328

Repetition and frequency attenuation in lexical access

Article  in  Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning Memory and Cognition · October 1984

DOI: 10.1037/0278-7393.10.4.680

CITATIONS READS

1,338 5,881

2 authors, including:

Kenneth Forster
The University of Arizona
121 PUBLICATIONS   16,860 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Kenneth Forster on 15 May 2014.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Copyright 1984 by the
Learning, Memory, and Cognition American Psychological Association, Inc.
1984, Vol. 10, No. 4, 680-698

Repetition Priming and Frequency Attenuation

in Lexical Access
Kenneth I. Forster and Chris Davis
Monash University, Victoria, Australia
Repetition priming effects in lexical decision tasks are stronger for low-frequency
words than for high-frequency words. This frequency attenuation effect creates
problems for frequency-ordered search models that assume a relatively stable
frequency effect. The suggestion is made that frequency attenuation is a product
of the involvement of the episodic memory system in the lexical decision process.
This hypothesis is supported by the demonstration of constant repetition effects
for high- and low-frequency words when the priming stimulus is masked; the
masking is assumed to minimize the influence of any possible episodic trace of
the prime. It is further shown that long-term repetition effects are much less
reliable when the subject is not required to make a lexical decision response to
the prime. When a response is required, the expected frequency attenuation effect
is restored. It is concluded that normal repetition effects consist of two components:
a very brief lexical effect that is independent of frequency and a long-term
episodic effect that is sensitive to frequency.

There has been much recent interest in the structure of the mental lexicon and the mech-
fact that in a lexical decision experiment, anisms of access (e.g., Morton, 1979, 1980;
where subjects are required to classify letter Scarborough, Gerard, & Cortese, 1979). On
strings as words or nonwords, there is a the other hand, it can be seen as a useful
substantial increase in both the speed and technique for studying memory processes
the accuracy of classification for words that (Jacoby & Dallas, 1981; Jaqoby & Wither-
are presented more than once during the spoon, 1982). On this view, the first presen-
experiment, even though considerable time tation of a word (the prime) establishes an
may have elapsed between successive presen- episodic memory trace mat is contacted when
tations (Forbach, Stanners, & Hochhaus, the same word (the target) is presented again.
1974; Kirsner & Smith, 1974; Scarborough, In some way this trace produces a facilitative
Cortese, & Scarborough, 1977). This phe- effect on perceptual tasks such as lexical
nomenon is referred to as the repetition effect. decision or accuracy of report with brief
There are basically two different approaches exposure. The important aspect of this ac-
to the repetition effect. On the one hand, it count for present purposes is that the repe-
is seen as the product of a temporary modi- tition effect can be explained without assum-
fication to the process of lexical access (e.g., ing that the lexical representation of the
Forbach et al., 1974). As a result of recent target word is altered in any way.
activation, the lexical representation of a These two different approaches can lead to
word is left in a state of increased accessibility. very different interpretations of the same
This priming effect can then be used as a data. Consider, for example, the problem of
powerful diagnostic tool for analyzing the cross-modal transfer. Morton (1979, 1980)
claims that there is no repetition effect at all
when the two presentations of the target word
This article is based in part on research reported by
are in different modalities. Because Morton
the second author as part of an honors thesis at Monash treats the repetition effect as a purely lexical
University. The research was supported by a grant from effect (i.e., as occurring totally within the
the Australian Research Grants Scheme. mental lexicon), he is forced to postulate that
The authors wish to thank Don Mitchell, Di Bradley, each word has a separate lexical representa-
and Don Thomson for extensive discussion and comments.
Requests for reprints should be sent to Kenneth I. tion (logogen) for each input modality. Hence,
Forster, Department of Psychology, Monash University, auditory presentation of a word leads to
Clayton, Victoria, Australia 3168. residual activation in its auditory input lo-
680
 REPETITION PRIMING
gogen but not in its visual input logogen.
However, if repetition is seen as the result of
the influence of episodic memory traces, then
quite different conclusions are possible. For
example, it could be argued that when the
target word is presented visually, then only
the memory traces of previous visual presen-
tations can produce a facilitative effect. Hence,
the lack of cross-modal transfer may have no
implications at all for the structure and or-
ganization of the mental lexicon. The same
arguments apply to the fact that there is no
transfer from picture naming to lexical deci-
sion. That is, saying "dog" in response to a
picture of a dog produces no facilitation for
subsequent lexical decisions on the word dog
(Scarborough et al., 1979). On a purely lexical
interpretation, this means that quite different
logogens must be activated by pictures and
by words. But on an episodic interpretation,
this result may mean only that the episodic
trace of the picture naming experience has
no effect in the lexical decision situation,
either because the episodic trace is not acti-
vated by seeing the word dog, or because it
is not activated rapidly enough, or because it
is simply irrelevant.
Similar problems arise in the interpretation
of what is referred to here as the frequency
attenuation effect. As shown by Scarborough
et al. (1977), low-frequency words benefit far
more from repetition than do high-frequency
words. If we adopt a purely lexical interpre-
tation of this effect, then the conclusion is
that the accessibility of a lexical representation
is a highly dynamic, labile property. This is
not what would be expected from lexical
search theories (Becker, 1979; Forster, 1976;
Stanners & Forbach, 1973), which assume
that the frequency effect reflects reasonably
static organizational properties of the mental
lexicon, with high-frequency words being lo-
cated earlier in the search path than low-
frequency words. Such theories would have
to be modified substantially to accommodate
the frequency attenuation effect. However, if
the repetition effect is not a true lexical effect,
this may not be necessary. For example, it is
well known that in tests of recognition mem-
ory (old-new classification), subjects are more
certain whether they have recently seen a
low-frequency word than a high-frequency
word (e.g., Glanzer & Bowles, 1976; Gregg,
681
1976; Scarborough et al., 1977). This advan-
tage for low-frequency words in episodic tasks
may be directly responsible for the frequency
attenuation effect, perhaps because the epi-
sodic traces of low-frequency words can be
contacted more efficiently.
From the viewpoint of theories of lexical
access, it is therefore necessary to assess
whether any particular property of the repe-
tition effect reflects alterations to the organi-
zation of lexical entries or whether it reflects
influences from episodic memory traces that
are quite external to the lexical processor
itself. It has been argued that episodic influ-
ence can be ruled out on the ground that
variables that normally affect the strength of
the episodic trace do not alter the repetition
effect (e.g., Jacoby & Dallas, 1981; Jacoby &
Witherspoon, 1982; Scarborough et al., 1977).
However, these experiments might have suc-
ceeded only in showing that the way in which
an episodic trace is utilized might vary across
tasks. For example, it could be that the lexical
decision task is much more sensitive to the
existence of episodic memory traces than is
an episodic task such as old-new classifica-
tion, and hence, trace strength is less relevant
in the lexical decision task.
Although this evidence in inconclusive,
there is clear evidence that episodic factors
are sometimes involved. Jacoby (1983) found
that as the proportion of words common to
the study and test lists was increased, the
magnitude of the repetition effect increased.
This is quite incompatible with a purely
lexical interpretation, because the only nec-
essary and sufficient condition for a repetition
effect should be the previous activation of
lexical representations. More compelling is
the evidence produced by Feustal, Shiffrin,
and Salasoo (1983). They pointed out that a
lexical view predicts no repetition effect for
nonwords because nonwords do not have
lexical representations, by definition. However,
some studies have reported small effects for
nonwords (e.g., Besner & Swan, 1982; Kirsner
& Smith, 1974; Scarborough et al., 1977),
although others have not (e.g., Forbach et al.,
1974). Feustal et al. pointed out that small
or non-existent effects may be expected be-
cause accessing an episodic trace may well
inhibit the no response required for nonwords.
By designing tasks that eliminate this prob-
682 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS
lem, they were able to demonstrate clear and
reliable repetition effects for nonwords.
This evidence suggests at least that the
repetition effect is a composite effect. How-
ever, there is also evidence for a stronger
conclusion, namely, that there is no purely
lexical repetition effect. Oliphant (1983)
compared the repetition effects in two situa-
tions. In the first condition, subjects made
lexical decisions on the same word on two
separate occasions, and normal repetition
effects were obtained. In the second condition,
the subjects were asked to read the instruc-
tions for the experiment aloud. Some of the
words in the instructions were then presented
for lexical decision. No repetition effect was
observed, despite the fact that the entries for
these words must have been-accessed during
the reading of the instructions. Oliphant's
conclusion was that the repetition effect was
not an automatic effect of recent exposure to
a word, but depended on the subject's aware-
ness of repetition and the development of
strategies to speed up processing of repeated
words.
Once the possibility of episodic involve-
ment is conceded, we can no longer be certain
of any of the properties of a purely lexical
repetition effect because there is no way to
decide which properties are produced by the
episodic component. The only way to remedy
this situation is to attempt to minimize the
contribution of episodic factors and to see
what properties remain. The aim of the pres-
ent series of experiments is to examine the
frequency attenuation effect under these con-
ditions.
One way to minimize episodic influences
is by masking the priming stimulus (the first
presentation) so that subjects are unable either
to report it or to recognize it. Although this
does not necessarily mean that no episodic
trace of the prime exists, it does imply that
it is relatively inaccessible. Hence, any sub-
sequent effect of this prime on the processing
of the same word would be relatively free of
episodic contamination. Precisely the same
lope was successfully applied by Balota (1983)
to the problem of contextual effects in epi-
sodic recognition. Balota was able to show
that the inhibiting effects of a change of
context on episodic recognition were absent
when the initial context was masked, even
though this masked context produced reliable
semantic priming effects.
Masked repetition effects were successfully
obtained by Evett and Humphreys (1981). In
these experiments, a sequence of four brief
stimuli was presented: mask; prime, target,
mask. The prime and the target were either
the same word or were different, but they
were always presented in a different case.
Pattern masks were used, and performance
was measured by accuracy of report of the
target stimulus. Significant repetition 'effects
were observed, despite the fact that the prime
and target stimuli were in different cases.
The first experiment employed an adapta-
tion of the Evett and Humphreys technique
to study frequency attenuation without epi-
sodic contamination. Instead of using accu-
racy of report of a masked target as the
dependent measure, lexical decision time was
used, and the target item was freely available.
If the frequency attenuation effect is a genuine
lexical effect, then elimination of the episodic
trace of the prime should have no effect, that
is, masked repetition effects should also be
greater for low-frequency words.
Experiment 1
Each trial consisted of a sequence of three
stimuli; the first two were in lowercase letters,
and the third was in uppercase letters. The
third stimulus was the target stimulus that
had to be classified as a word or as a nonword.
The second stimulus was the prime and was
either identical to the target stimulus (but in
lowercase letters) or was different. The first
stimulus was always a neutral word, unrelated
to any other in the sequence. Both the first
and third items were presented for 500 ms,
whereas the prime was presented for 60 ms.
The only purpose of the first word was to act
as a forward mask for the prime.
A pilot experiment using this technique
established that words preceded by an iden-
tical prime in a different case were responded
to 35 ms faster than were words preceded by
a nonidentical prime. There was no repetition
effect for nonwords; the difference was 4 ms
in the wrong direction. The durations of the
three stimuli were chosen by the experiment-
ers so that the prime appeared invisible to
them and the subjects of the pilot study. To
check this, two further pilot studies were
 REPETITION PRIMING 683

conducted to assess the amount of informa- sequential display of the three members of a triad; each
tion available to awareness. In the first of durations member was displayed in the center of the screen. The
these additional pilot studies, subjects were whereas theof second the first and third members was 500 ms,
member was displayed for 60 ms.
told that the sequence in fact consisted of Each member was displayed immediately after the pre-
three stimuli. Their task was.merely to guess ceding member.
whether the second item contained the same uppercase The subject was instructed to classify the item in
sequence of letters as the third item. Twelve nonword. Itletters (the third member) as a word or a
was explained that this would always be the
subjects were tested with a set of 60 words final member, but no mention was made of the number
and 60 nonwords. The overall error rate was of items in the total sequence. Each trial was initiated
41%, Some subjects reported that they occa: by the subject, and feedback was provided concerning
sionally managed to see one letter in the their both accuracy and speed of response. Subjects indicated
decisions by a selective button press, with the
prime, and if the target stimulus contained preferred hand used for yes decisions. A different pseu-
that letter, they responded same. This might dorandom sequence was prepared for each subject, and
have accounted for the slightly better than a set of 10 practice items was included. Subjects were
chance performance. In the second additional given either the first or the second set of item's, so that
pilot study, the same materials were used, subject. item was responded to more than once by any
no test
but subjects were required to guess whether Subjects. A total of 28 volunteer undergraduates
the second stimulus was a word. Twelve sub- served as subjects. Any subject making more than 20%
jects were used, and it is worth noting that errors was rejected. No subject had participated in any
all subjects commented on the extreme diffi- of the pilot studies.
culty, if not absurdity, of the task. In fact,
the overall error rate was 50%, and no subject Results
made fewer than 45% errors. Hence, it seems
safe to conclude that very little precise infor- In this experiment, as in subsequent ex-
mation about the prime as a whole was periments, the effects of outliers were curtailed
available for conscious recall. by cutoffs established 2 standard deviations
above and below the mean of each subject.
Method Data from trials on which an error occurred
Materials and design. The target items consisted of were discarded. Separate analyses of the sub-
60 words and 60 legal nonwords, Half of the words were ject and item means were carried out and
high-frequency words, chosen at random from a frequency were combined to form F'min values according
range of 40-60 occurrences per million (Kucera & Francis, to the procedure recommended by Clark
1967). Half were low-frequency words, chosen at random
from a frequency range of 1-2 occurrences per minion. (1973).
These words were all judged by the experimenters to be Mean lexical decision times and error rates
within the working vocabulary of the typical subject (e.g., for both words and nonwords are shown in
ADORE, HEAVE, ARID, FROCK). A ,S6t Of 120 triads W8S Table 1. The results for the words were
constructed; the third member was one of the above analyzed in a 2 X 2 X 2 factorial design; the
target items in uppercase letters. The second member
was either the same letter sequence as the third or was a factors were groups (subject groups in the
different sequence of the same length. In this latter case, analysis of subject means, item groups in the
it was a word if the target item was a word, otherwise it analysis of item means), frequency (high vs.
was a nonword. The second member was presented in low), and repetition (repeated vs. nohre-
lowercase letters, and hence was physically different from peated).
the third in all triads. The first member was a randomly
chosen dummy word in lowercase letters. All targets were For words, lexical decision times were faster
4-?6 letters in length. (598 ms) if they were immediately preceded
A second set of 120 triads was constructed that had by the same word than if they were not (640
the same target items as the first but had different ms); this effect was significant, F' (l, 56) =
preceding items. These triads were constructed so that if min
a triad in the first set contained a repetition (e.g., absent 15.41, p < .001. There was also a significant
circle CIRCLE), its corresponding member in the second main effect of frequency; high-frequency
set did not (e.g.,; beam device CIRCLED and vice versa. words were classified faster (573 ms) than
Thus, it was possible to examine performance on the were low-frequency words (665 ms), F'mi«(l,
same set of items in both the repeated and nonrepeated
conditions. • 64) = 23.66, p < ,001. However, there was
Procedure, Items were presented on a computer- no significant interaction between these main
controlled video display. Each trial consisted of the effects; the repetition effect for high-frequency
684 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS

Table 1 scious report. In addition, the results suggest

Experiment 1: Mean Lexical Decision Times (KT that the nature of the priming effect is differ-
in Milliseconds) and Percentage of Errors for ent from that observed in more conventional
Repeated and Nonrepeated Items Using repetition studies where the priming stimulus
Masked Primes
is not masked (e.g., Scarborough et al., 1977).
The difference is that equal priming effects
Item type Example RT error are observed for both high- and low-frequency
words.
High-frequency The primary purpose of masking the prime
words
Repeated absent avoid 550 2.9 was to prevent the possibility that episodic
AVOID traces of the prime might influence the de-
Nonrepeated bullet taste 595 4.5 cision process. If this goal has in fact been
AVOIP achieved, then the results suggest that the
Repetition effect 45 1.6 attenuation of the frequency effect produced
Low-frequency
words by repetition can be attributed to episodic
Repeated cloud heave 646 15.3 factors.
HEAVE Before we consider the implications of this
Nonrepeated cape exalt 684 21.2 conclusion, there are a number of alternative
HEAVE
Repetition effect 38 5.9 interpretations that should be considered.
Nonwords First, it should be noted that Evett and
Repeated brass tovid 687 6.9 Humphreys (1981) interpreted their findings
TOVID in terms of graphemic priming effects. Lo-
Nonrepeated . complete astol 679 6.0 gogens are assumed to be partially activated
TOVID
Repetition effect -8 -0.9 by the presence of letters in specific positions,
regardless of visual format (case). Hence, the
logogen for STATE will be activated by prior
words (45 ms) was slightly larger than the exposure to a similar word, such as STARE,
effect for low-frequency words (38 ms, and even by prior exposure to a nonword
F'min < 1). such as STAFE. This increase in activation
Analysis of the error rates for words shows may well be a very temporary phenomenon,
the expected higher error rate for low-fre- only detectable with very short intervals be-
quency words, and although there is a trend tween the prime and the target. It may also
toward fewer errors for repeated items, this have nothing to do with the normal repetition
effect was not significant, FJnin(l", 68) = 3.25, effects observed in experiments employing
p > .05. The Frequency X Repetition inter- much longer intervals with many intervening
action was not significant. items, that is, the repetition effect observed
The results for nonwords were analyzed in in this experiment might be a much more
a 2 X 2 design; the factors were Groups and limited phenomenon. In the extreme case, it
Repetition. It is clear that nonwords do not could even be suggested that the priming
show a repetition effect, because repeated action is limited merely to the detection of
nonwords took slightly longer to classify than the graphemic form of the test stimulus, and
did nonrepeated nonwords, and repeated hence, it is not at all surprising that equal
nonwords produced slightly more errors. priming effects are observed for high- and
Neither of these effects was significant low-frequency words.
(tfnta < I)-
In order to show that the effects observed
in this experiment are genuine word-repetition
Discussion effects, it is therefore necessary to show that
the priming is not the result of a letter-
The results of this experiment confirm the repetition effect or of a graphemic priming
findings of Evett and Humphreys (1981) in effect. The letter-repetition interpretation
demonstrating that significant repetition ef- seems unlikely, because this should have pro-
fects can be obtained even when the prime duced priming effects for nonwords as well
is heavily masked and is unavailable for con- as words. However, this evidence is irrelevant
 REPETITION PRIMING 685

to the graphemic priming interpretation, be- (e.g., bend-BOND, peck-PACK, dusk-oiSK). For the dis-
cause this depends on the existence of a similar pairs, the prime was chosen from the same
frequency range as the target. For nonwords, the prime
logogen corresponding to the target stimulus. was always either a similar nonword (e.g., mulp-MiLP,
The only way to test this hypothesis is to cusk-cisic, tasm-TiSM), or a dissimilar nonword (e.g.,
repeat the first experiment using graphemi- leng-QRAD, trie-STOL, nout-SAMP).
cally similar prime-target word pairs. If no As in Experiment 1, these pairs were preceded by a
facilitation is produced, then the conclusion dummy word. The lengths of all three items in each
triad were the same (4 letters). Again, two sets of
that we are dealing with a genuine word- materials were constructed so that targets preceded by a
repetition effect is strengthened. The next similar prime in one set were preceded by a dissimilar
experiment was designed to examine this prime in the other, and vice versa.
issue. Procedure. The method of presentation and testing
was exactly the same as in Experiment 1.
Subjects. A total of 24 undergraduate volunteers who
Experiment 2 had not participated in any of the preceding experiments
The priming effect observed in the first was used. Half were run with one set of materials, and
half were run with the counterbalanced version.
experiment might have been a genuine word-
repetition effect in the sense that it was due
to the repeated access of the same lexical Results
entry. Alternatively, it might simply have The mean lexical decision times for the
arisen from the graphemic overlap between target items are shown in Table 2. These
the prime and the target; this overlap could results show that there is a difference of only
have produced a letter-repetition effect, be- 1 ms (in the wrong direction) for the word
cause the same letters had to be processed targets as a function of similarity, whereas
for both stimuli, or it could have produced a for nonword targets, the effect is only 7 ms.
graphemic priming effect, in which the pro- Neither of these differences was significant
cessing of the prime produces activation in (^"min < 1). There were also no significant
the logogens of all graphemically similar effects of similarity on the error rates, Further
words. If either of these alternative explana- analysis of the results for the similar words
tions is correct, then it should be possible to condition showed no effect of the frequency
demonstrate transfer effects between similar of the prime. Words preceded by a similar
primes and targets such as lump-UMP, as prime of higher frequency were responded to
shown by Evett and Humphreys (1981) in a slightly slower (528 ms) than were words
tachistdscopic accuracy task. preceded by a similar prime of lower fre-
As in the first experiment, a lexical decision quency (520 ms), but this difference was not
task was used, and the prime was masked by significant (F'mia < 1).
its surrounding context. Priming effects for
both word and nonword targets was exam-
ined. Discussion
These results indicate that graphemic over-
Method lap between the prime and the target produces
Materials and design. A total of 60 triads was con- very little impact on lexical decision times
structed as in Experiment 1 except that instead of having for the target. This indicates that the priming
half of the primes identical to the target, they differed
from the target by one medial letter. Half of the targets effect observed in Experiment 1 was not due
were words chosen from a frequency range of 20-30 either to a letter repetition effect or to gra-
occurrences per million; half were legal nonwords. Half phemic priming. In order for the prime to
of the word targets were preceded by a briefly presented influence lexical decisions, the target must be
dissimilar prime that had no more than one letter in the
same position as the target (e.g., cure-MALE, bowl-piLE, a word (because no priming occurred for
tire-LOST), The remaining targets were preceded by a nonwords in Experiment 1), and the prime
similar prime in which only one letter differed from the must be identical to the target. These prop-
target. Because it was difficult to control the frequency erties appear to meet the requirements of a
of such similar pairs precisely, it was decided to manipulate genuine word-repetition effect.
this variable systematically. Half of the similar primes
were higher in frequency than the target (e.g., line-LANE, It should be noted that these results are in
past-POST, hall-HELL), and half were lower in frequency sharp contrast to those of Evett and Hum-
686 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS

Table 2 it seems much less likely that such a conflation

Experiment 2: Mean Lexical Decision Times (RT of prime and target would occur. Because the
in Milliseconds) and Percentage of Errors for only effect observed with the lexical decision
Items Preceded by Graphemically Similar task is an effect of identical repetition, we
and Dissimilar Masked Primes must assume that the same effect would have
occurred in Evett and Humphreys' experi-
Item type Example RT error ment. However, the remaining effects in their
experiment may be attributable to conflation.
Words It is also worthwhile noting that Feustal et
Similar prime harm lack 524 11.0
LOCK al. (1983) reported small but significant
Dissimilar harm bowl 523 14.2 priming effects produced by graphemic over-
prime LOCK lap of the prime and target. In this case,
Priming 1
3.2 however, the prime and target were separated
effect
Nonwords by a number of intervening items, so rather
Similar prime dirt nila 552 7.1 different mechanisms must be involved. They
NELA also used an identification accuracy task, and
Dissimilar dirt wold 559 2.1 it may be that graphemic similarity effects
prime NELA
are restricted to this type of task.
Priming 7 -5.0
effect The results of this experiment are also
relevant to studies dealing with conflicting
graphemic and phonemic overlap. While
Meyer, Schvaneveldt, and Ruddy (1974) found
phreys (1981). They found that similar primes no significant facilitation for pairs such as
produced facilitation for target identification, BRIBE-TRIBE, subsequent investigators have
whether the prime was a word or a nonword. reported such effects (Hillinger, 1980; Shul-
The most obvious difference between the man, Hornak, & Sanders, 1978). One possible
experiments is that Evett and Humphreys reason for the discrepancy may be that the
used an accuracy response measure, and the location of the difference between the prime
target word also was masked. One possible and target varies (medial in the present case,
consequence of this is that the subjects might initial in all others). However, a more: likely
have combined information from the prime reason is that strategic factors play a role in
and the target. For example, suppose that the these experiments but are most unlikely to
target word is STATE, and the subject manages be involved in the current experiment because
to identify only the last three letters. Suppose,presumably, awareness of the nature of the
also, that he has identified the first two letters
prime would be a necessary precondition for
of the prime as st. If these partial identifica- the development of a successful strategy that
tions are combined, the correct word is pro- exploited the relation between the prime and
duced, whether the prime was the identical the target.
word STATE, a similar word STARE, or even a
similar nonword STAFE. Such a combination Experiment 3
strategy need not, of course, be intentional.
This interpretation is best supported by The repetition effect observed in Experi-
the fact that priming was produced by gra- ment 1 with masked primes was insensitive
phemically similar nonwords. Furthermore, to word frequency, that is, there was no
as the authors noted, subjects occasionally attenuation of the frequency effect for re-
made errors by inserting letters from the peated items. This result suggests that when
prime into the target (e.g., responding STRING episodic involvement in the repetition effect
to the prime-target pair yoing-STRiPE). The is minimized, frequency attenuation effects
fact that this involves a change of case simply are also minimized.
indicates that subjects are using abstract This conclusion would be strengthened if
properties rather than physical properties. it could be shown that frequency attenuation
However, in a lexical decision task, where effects are found for the same experimental
the target is not masked but is freely available, items when the prime is not masked, and the
 REPETITION PRIMING 687

repetition effect is produced in the normal Table3

way. This is the aim of the present experiment. Experiment 3: Mean Lexical Decision Times (RT
The design of the experiment consisted of in Milliseconds) and Percentage of Errors for
two phases. In Phase 1, words and nonwords Words and Nonwords in Phase 2 Preceded
by Primes in Phase 1
were-presented in lowercase letters for lexical
decision. In Phase 2, the same items were Item type RT % error
presented again, along with an equal number
of items that appeared for the first time. All High-frequency words
items in Phase 2 were presented in uppercase Repeated 50L 2.9
Nonrepeated 531 4.8
letters, so that there was a shift in case Repetition effect 30 1.9
between the first and second presentations. Low-frequency words
Although changes in the physical format of Repeated 552 12.4
the stimuli are not particularly critical for Nonrepeated 615 21.9
Repetition effect 63 9.5
the repetition effect (Feustal et al, 1983; Nonwords
Scarborough et al., 1977), this procedure Repeated 606 4.3
makes the conditions of this experiment more Nonrepeated 598 2.0
comparable with those of Experiment 1, Repetition effect -8 -2.3
where primes and test stimuli also differed in Note, Lexical decision required for primes.
case.
The two-phase procedure was chosen in
preference to a single list design with intralist Results and Discussion
repetition in order to minimize possible stra-
tegic effects. In the two-phase design, all The mean lexical decision times for both
primes will have been presented before any words and nonwords in Phase 2 are given in
repetition occurs, and hence the encoding of Table 3.
the primes cannot be affected by the subject's The effect of word frequency (68 ms) was
perception of repetition. However, in a single significant, F'min(l, 57) = 26.05, p < .001, as
list design, the subjects will have noted the was the effect of repetition (47 ms), F'min(l,
fact that items are repeated quite early in the 40) = 21.56, p< .001. There was also a sig-
list, and hence might attend more closely to nificant interaction between these main ef-
subsequently presented primes. fects, Fmin(l, 44) = 5.06, p < .05; high-fre-
quency words snowed a smaller repetition
Method effect (30 ms) than did low-frequency words
(63 ms). However, both of these individual
Materials and design. The experimental items were repetition effects were highly significant: for
the same as those used in Experiment t. Throughout the high-frequency words, Fmin(l, 51) = 8.85,
experiment, subjects were presented with a single word p < .01, and for low-frequency words, F'minU,
or nonword for lexical decision. The experiment consisted
of two phases. In Phase 1, subjects were presented with 39)= 17.87, p<. 001.
15 high-frequency words, 15 low-frequency words, and For nonwords, the effect of repetition was
30 nonwords, all in lowercase letters. In Phase 2, the slightly inhibitory (-8 ms), but this effect
same items were presented again in uppercase letters, was significant only in the analysis of item
along with an equal number of words and nonwords that means, F(l, 58) = 6.07, p < .05, not subject
appeared for the first time. Two sets of materials were
constructed. For both sets, Phase 2 consisted of the' same means, f{l, 26) = 3.16, p > .05. This suggests
set of 120 items. Half of these items were randomly that repetition produces a spurious familiarity
chosen for inclusion in Phase 1 for the first set, and the effect for some subjects but not all subjects.
other half were chosen for the second set. Thus, materials The error results show a very similar pat-
were counterbalanced across the Repetition factor. From
the subject's point of view, the division of the experiment tern. As expected, more errors were made on
into phases was to clearly separate the lowercase items low-frequency words than were made on high-
from the uppercase items. frequency words, FJninO, 81) = 22.75, p <
Subjects. A total of 28 volunteer undergraduates (the .001. Repetition reduced the total number of
same number as in Experiment 1) served as subjects and errors for words, Fmin(l, 57) = 6.87, p < .05,
were paid. Subjects were assigned to one set of materials
or the other in the order of their appearance at the and tended to reduce the number of errors
laboratory. for low-frequency words to a greater extent
688 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS
than it did for high-frequency words, although
this interaction effect was marginal, F'mm(l,
62) = 3,40, p < .10 (both subject and item
analyses were significant). For nonwords,
however, the inhibitory effect of repetition
was very strong, f"min (1, 60) = 12.36,
These results clearly demonstrate that the
experimental items used in Experiment 1
produce a frequency attenuation effect when
the repetition effect is induced in the standard
manner. Hence, the absence of frequency
attenuation in Experiment 1 cannot be at-
tributed to item sampling errors nor can it
be attributed to a lack of power, because the
power of this experiment was designed to be
the same as that of Experiment 1. Hence, it
seems reasonable to conclude that the pro-
cedure of masking the prime is responsible.
It may be suggested that masking the prime
does not really alter the size of the repetition
effect at all but instead prevents access for a
proportion of the low-frequency primes,
thereby lowering the average repetition effect
for low-frequency words from the 63-ms value
observed in the present experiment to the
value of 38 ms observed in Experiment 1.
This value of 38 ms represents a composite
value from items where the prime was ac-
cessed (each producing a "normal" repetition
effect of 63 ms) and from items where the
prime was not accessed (producing a repeti-
tion effect of zero). Two features of the results
suggest that this is not the correct interpre-
tation. First, it would be expected that mask-
ing would also reduce the repetition effect
for high-frequency words, although not to the
same degree. However, the reverse is the case,
because the effect for high-frequency words
with masked primes in Experiment 1 (45 ms)
was greater than in the present experiment
(30 ms). Second, it should be the case that
for low-frequency words with masked primes,
the variances of the decision times for re-
peated items should be much greater than
those for nonrepeated items (because the
former are bimodally distributed). To test
this hypothesis, the item variances were cal-
culated separately for each subject in Exper-
iment 1. The obtained mean variances were
very similar: 160.7 for repeated low-frequency
words and 150.6 for nonrepeated low-fre-
quency words (12 of the 28 subjects failed to
show this trend). Moreover, when high-fre-
quency words were included as a control,
half of the subjects showed, a greater repeti-
tion-induced increase in variance for low-
frequency words than they did for high-
frequency words, and half showed the opposite
effect.
Masking the prime was intended to mini-
mize any possible episodic contamination of
the repetition effect. If this was the only
consequence of masking, then we should
infer that frequency attenuation is a by-
product of an episodically mediated process.
However, it may be that the procedures of
Experiments 1 and 3 also differ in other ways.
For example, the delay between the prime
and target was only 60 ms in Experiment 1,
whereas in this experiment, it could have
ranged from 5 min to 10 min. It is therefore
possible that frequency attenuation only oc-
curs with long delays between presentations.
This possibility cannot be ignored, although
it has been argued that the standard repetition
effect is quite unaffected by:lag (e.g., Feustal
et al., 1983; Jacoby & Dallas, 1981; Scarbor-
ough et al., 1977, 1979). In addition, Berger
(1980) showed clear frequency attenuation
effects when the lag in a standard repetition
design was only one item. A more crucial
difference between the two experiments is the
fact that in the current experiment, subjects
were required to make a lexical classification
of both the prime and the target, whereas in
the first experiment, no specific response to
the prime was required (nor was it possible
make such a requirement, because the prime
was not visible).
This raises the interesting possibility that
frequency attenuation effects may be restricted
to designs that require a specific decision to
be made about the prime. This possibility
can be examined by repeating the present
experiment without requiring the subject to
respond in any way to the prime. This was
attempted in the next experiment.
Experiment 4
The purpose of this experiment was to
determine whether the frequency character-
istics of the standard repetition effect depend
on the type of response that must be made
to the prime. The design of this experiment
paralleled that of Experiment 3 in that there
were two phases: The primes were presented
in Phase 1, and the effects of these primes
 REPETITION PRIMING 689

were assessed in Phase 2. The only difference Table 4

between the experiments was that the primes Experiment 4: Mean Lexical Decision Times (PT
were not presented for lexical decision. In- in Milliseconds) and Percentage of Errors for
stead, they were presented as part of the Word Targets in Phase 1 Preceded by a Masked
Prime and for Word Targets in Phase 2 Preceded
context for another target word altogether. by a Context Prime in Phase 1
So, for example, a subject might have received
the following combination: Item type RT error
Phase 1: doctor-(annoy)-ANNOY,
Phase 2: DOCTOR. Phase 1 word targets:
Masked priming
In both phases, the task is to make a lexical Repeated 558 1.0
decision to the target in uppercase letters. Nonrepeated 610 1.6
The items in Phase 1 were presented under Repetition effect 52 0.6
the same conditions as in Experiment 1; the Phase 2 targets:
parentheses indicate the masked word. The High-frequency words
Repeated 569 5.0
question is whether the initial experience of Nonrepeated 577 4.5
doctor as a context item would serve as a Repetition effect 8 -0.5
prime for later classification of DOCTOR in Low-frequency words
Phase 2, and whether this effect would be Repeated 618 12.6
Nonrepeated 646 19.1
sensitive to frequency. Repetition effect 28 6.5
Method
The design of this experiment was similar to that of
Experiment 3. There were two phases; the primes were in Phase 1 preceded by a masked prime and
presented in Phase 1, and the targets were presented in for the word targets in Phase 2 preceded by
Phase 2, The materials and procedure for Phase 2 were an earlier presentation of the same word as
identical to Experiment 3; 60 words and 60 nonwords a context item in Phase 1.
were presented for lexical decision. The items in Phase
1 were structured in the same way as the items in Consider first the masked repetition effects
Experiment 1: two context items followed by a target during Phase 1. It is shown in Table 4 that
item that had to be classified as a word or as a nonword. primed items were classified faster (558 ms)
The duration of the first and last members of this triad than were unprimed items (610 ms). This
was 500 ms; the middle member was presented for 60 masked repetition effect of 52 ms was highly
ms. The first two members were in lowercase letters,
while the third member was in uppercase letters. significant, Fmin(l, 53) = 15.54, p< .001,
Half of the words and nonwords presented for lexical and confirms the results of Experiment 1.
decision in Phase 2 were also presented in Phase 1 as an Considering next the results in Phase 2, it
initial member of a triad (for which no response was can be seen that overall, words repeated
required). As before, two sets of materials were constructed
with a different half of the items repeated across the two across phases were responded to faster (593
phases. In addition, IS of the word targets in Phase 1 ms) than were unrepeated words (611 ms),
were preceded by a masked repetition of the same word but this 18-ms effect of•. repetition was only
in different case, and a further 15 of the word targets marginally significant, Fmin(l, 76) = 3.57,
were preceded by a different word of the same length. p< .10 (significant effects were obtained in
Items repeated in this way in the first set of materials
were nonrepeated in the second set, and vice versa. The both the subject and item analyses). High-
remaining targets in Phase 1 were irrelevant to the frequency words produced faster responses
experiment. than did low-frequency words, f'min(l, 81) =
The instructions to subjects emphasized that in Phase 25,76, p < .001, but there was no significant
1, a lexical decision was required only for the item in
uppercase letters, but subjects were asked to read the Repetition X Frequency interaction (jF'min <
material that preceded this item. It was further explained 1; nonsignificant results were obtained in
that in the second phase, only single words, and nonwords both subject and item analyses). Considering
would be presented. the repetition results for high- and low-fre-
As in Experiments 1 and 3,28 volunteer undergraduates quency words separately, there was an effect
served as subjects.
of only 8 ms for high-frequency words, which
Results and Discussion
was not significant (F'min < 1), while for low-
frequency words, there was a nonsignificant
The mean lexical decision times and error effect of 28 ms, F'mln(l, 37) - 2.77, p > .05
rates are given in Table 4 for the word targets (a significant subject effect was obtained).
690 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS
These results appear to indicate that the
normal repetition effect is very weak under
the conditions of this experiment. The same
materials in Experiment 3 produced highly
significant repetition effects for both high-
frequency words and low-frequency words.
Comparison across the two experiments
showed that the effect for low-frequency words
in Experiment 3 (63 ms) was significantly
greater than the corresponding effect with the
same items in the present experiment, Fmin(l,
77) = 4.14, p < .05, while the effect for high-
frequency words uv Experiment 3 (24 ms)
did not differ significantly from the present
effect, F'minO, 76) = 2.46,> > .05, although
both subject and item analyses did produce
significant differences.
These results strongly suggest that the mag-
nitude of the repetition effect is influenced
by the response required to the prime (espe-
cially for low-frequency words). If subjects
are merely required to silently read the prime,
then the repetition ..effect is weak compared
with a condition in which subjects must
classify the prime. Unfortunately, this weak-
ening of the effect makes it difficult to answer
the question of central interest: Do low-
frequency words show the same repetition
effect as high-frequency words? The lack of
a significant Repetition Effect X Frequency
interaction is not very informative, because
there is no clear repetition effect for either
word class.
Nevertheless, the results of this experiment
fit quite well with the general argument that
the standard repetition effect is contaminated
by episodic factors. If repeated access of the
same lexical entry was the sole determinant
of repetition effects, then the present experi-
ment should have produced results compa-
rable with those of Experiment 3, which it
clearly did not. It seems that the only way to
resist this argument is to argue that subjects
did not necessarily process the context words
in Phase 1 and hence did not access the
relevant entries. But if this were the case, it
would be hard to explain why there was such
a strong masked repetition effect for the
target items in Phase 1 (if the masked item
was processed enough to have an effect, the
much more visible context item should have
been processed also). The failure to find a
clear repetition effect using nontarget primes
is consistent with the findings of Oh'phant
(1983), who failed to find repetition effects
when the primes were presehted as part of
the instructions for the experiment. This result
implies that subjects need to perceive the
primes as somehow relevant; to task perfor-
mance before a strong repetition effect occurs.
It would perhaps be premature to conclude
from these experiments that there is no rep-
etition effect with nontarget priming (more
powerful designs might well'detect a small
effect) nor would it be proper to conclude
that targets are the only adequate primes.
What can be concluded is that nonlexical
factors are almost certainly involved in the
standard repetition effect.
Experiment 5
The masked repetition effects observed in
Experiment 1 and in Phase 1 of Experiment
4 were obtained when the prime and target
were immediately adjacent. Obviously, if this
effect really reflects a temporary increase in
the accessibility of a lexical entry, then the
same result should be obtained when other
items are interpolated between the prime and
target. If a masked repetition effect occurs
under these conditions, then several alternative
explanations of the effect can be eliminated.
One such possibility is that the effects are
really due to some kind of differential masking
effect. For example, it could be that the visual
similarity of the lowercase and uppercase
versions of the same letter is greater than the
average similarity of the lowercase and up-
percase versions of different letters. Hence,
"repeated" items are really successive presen-
tations of visually similar forms. Because the
prime presumably produces a forward mask-
ing effect on the target, it is possible that this
masking effect is less for repeated items due
to greater visual similarity. However, if the
prime is no longer adjacent to the target and
if the target is always preceded by a constant
stimulus, then any such effects should be
eliminated.
A similar argument applies to the possibil-
ity of graphemic priming effects, because
these would not be expected to persist across
intervening items. It should be noted that
evidence has already been produced against
both of these proposals. If suich effects oc-
curred, then nonwords should have shown
the same repetition effects as did words in
 REPETITION PRIMING 691

Experiment 1, and graphemically similar Tables

primes should have produced facilitative ef- Experiment 5: Mean Lexical Decision Times (KT
fects in Experiment 2. in Milliseconds) and Percentage of Errors for
For these reasons, it was decided to attempt Items Preceded by Identical or Different
to replicate the findings of Experiment 1 Primes Using Both Masked and
Unmasked (no mask) Primes
using nonadjacent primes and targets. Quite
apart from the arguments just presented, it Masked Unmasked
would also be desirable to replicate the in- prime prime
dependence of masked repetition effects and
frequency. , Item type RT error RT error
Target items in this experiment were pre-
ceded by five context items, with the prime High-frequency
located in Positions 2, 3, or 4. A further words
manipulation involved the duration of the Repeated 475 3.5 459 1.9
Nonrepeated 488 4.2 477 3.8
prime; This was presented either for 60 ms Repetition effect 13 0.7 18 1.9
(as in Experiment 1) or for the same duration Low-frequency words
as the other context items (500 ms). These Repeated 500 9.6 484 4.5
latter primes are, of course, perfectly visible Nonrepeated 513 13.8 519 11.2
Repetition effect 13 4.2 35 6.7
and correspond to the unmasked primes used Nonwords •
in Experiment 4. It will be recalled that these Repeated 550 9.8 548 7.9
primes did not produce a clear repetition . Nonrepeated 538 6.1 549 6.7
effect. The present experiment examines Repetition effect -12 -3.7 1 -1.2
whether the same result occurs with a much
reduced lag.
random to these conditions. In each set, there were eight
Method word conditions (Frequency X Masking X Repetition),
with 12 items in each condition. For nonwords, there
Materials and design. A total of 192 target items was were four conditions (Masking X Repetition), with 24
selected; half were words, and half were legal nonwords. items in each condition.
The words were either drawn from a high-frequency Procedure. The sequence of five context items was
range (65-90 occurrences per million) or a low-frequency presented at a rate of 500 ms per item except for the
range (below 5 occurrences per million). A context of 5 masked prime, which was presented for only 60 ms,
items was constructed for each target, consisting of 4 Unmasked primes were presented for 500 ms, as was the
words and 1 legal nonword. For all targets, either the target. The only departure from the general conditions
2nd, 3rd, or 4th context item was the prime. In repeated of Experiment 1 was that a 500-ms warning signal was
trials/the prime was the same as the target but was in a introduced immediately prior to the target, in order to
different case. For nonrepeated trials, the prime was a reduce uncertainty about which item was the target.
completely different item. For repeated nonword trials, Subjects were instructed to read passively the context
only 1 nonword was included in the context (the prime), items, and to classify the uppercase item following the
and this occurred equally often in Positions 2-4. thus, warning signal (a pair of separated angled brackets) as a
every context contained t nonword, thereby preventing word or nonword. '
the presence of a nonword from signalling to the subject Subjects. A total of 26 volunteer undergraduates
that the target item would be a nonword. served as subjects and were-paid for their participation
Context items were presented in lowercase letters, and in the experiment. Subjects were assigned to the two
target items were presented in uppercase letters. The different sets of materials in the order of their appearance
lengths of the context items were always matched to the at the laboratory.
length of the target. For repeated trials, half were desig-
nated as masked repetitions, and half were designated as Results
unmasked repetitions. Two sets of materials were con-
structed, so that materials were counterbalanced across The mean lexical decision times and error
the Repetition factor, Thus, a repeated item in one.setrates for each condition are shown in Table
was preceded by the same context in the second set
5. The results for words were analyzed sepa-
except for the repetition. For example, if the first set
contained the following repeated word item: rately for the masked and unmasked prime
contact-kitehen-chomple-trivial-dentist-KiTeHEN, theconditions and were collapsed over the posi-
second, set contained the corresponding nonrepeated word
tion of the prime. For the masked priming
item:
contact-develop-chomple-trivial-dentist-KiTCHEN, condition, there was a significant main effect
However, materials were not counterbalanced acro'ss of frequency, Fmin(l, 65) « 9.72, p < ;01, and
the Masked-Unmasked factor; items were assigned at also a significant main effect of repetition,
692 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS
F'min(l, 54) = 4.39, p < .05. Because exactly
the same repetition effect (13 ms) was ob-
served for both high- and low-frequency
words, there was, of course, no interaction
between these main effects. The analysis of
errors showed the usual effect of frequency;
low-frequency words produced more errors,
•F'minO, 63) = 10.06, p < .01. However, no
other effects were significant or even ap-
proached significance.
For the unmasked condition, there was
again a significant main effect of frequency
on lexical decision times, Fmin(l, 64) = 10.22,
p < .01. There was also a significant repetition
effect, .FminO, 66) = 13.93, p < .001. In this
case, the repetition effect for low-frequency
words (35 ms) was nearly twice as large as
the effect for high-frequency words (18 ms),
although this interaction effect failed to reach
significance, F'mia(l, 59) = 2.11, p> .05. Sig-
nificance was reached for the item analysis,
F(\, 44) = 4.56, p < .05, but not for the
subject analysis, F(\, 24) = 3.92, p > .05.
Analysis of the errors showed significant ef-
fects for frequency and repetition, but no
significant interaction.
Several features should be noted. Although
the repetition effect with masked primes (13
ms) is once again insensitive to frequency, it
is much smaller than the effect observed in
Experiment 1 (43 ms), the first pilot study
(35 ms), and the effect observed in Phase 1
of Experiment 4 (52 ms). It could be that the
increase in the interval between the prime
and the target from 60 ms in the earlier
experiments to a range of 1,060-2,060 ms in
the present experiment is responsible. If so,
then it suggests that the duration of the
masked repetition effect is very limited.
The results for nonwords are shown in
Table 5. In the masked condition, there is
clearly no repetition effect, whereas in the
unmasked case, there is a reverse effect of
repetition. Analysis of these results in a 2 X
2 X 2 factorial design, with Groups, Masking,
and Repetition as factors, showed no signifi-
cant main effects (F'min < 1). The Masking X
Repetition interaction effect also was nonsig-
nificant, Fmin(l, 58) = 2.12, p > .05, although
the item analysis did show a significant effect,
F(\, 92) - 5.40, p < .05. The failure of the
subject analysis suggests that the interference
effect observed for unmasked primes was
only observed for some subjects. A similar
pattern of results was obtained for the errors,
although none of the effects approached sig-
nificance.
Discussion
The results of this experiment provide a
clear replication of the results of Experiment
1. Masked primes again produce equal rep-
etition effects (though small) for high- and
low-frequency words. Because these effects
were obtained when the prime and the target
were separated by at least one intervening
item, a graphemic priming interpretation is
made less plausible. In addition, we can rule
out visual interference effects because the
material immediately prior to the target is
held constant.
The second result of interest is the fact
that the unmasked primes do not show a
significant frequency attenuation effect, al-
though there is an obvious tendency in this
direction. Although it would obviously be
unwise to conclude that there is no attenua-
tion at all, it does seem clear that the reliability
of the frequency attenuation effect is affected
by removing the requirement to respond to
the prime. This is consistent with the argu-
ment that frequency attenuation is primarily
an episodic phenomenon and that episodic
effects are enhanced by requiring a response
to tne prime. Clearly, more evidence is re-
quired to determine whether context items
are capable of producing a standard, long-
term, frequency-sensitive effect, but this goes
beyond the scope of the present article.
Finally, it should be noted that this exper-
iment raises the possibility that lag effects
can be demonstrated when subjects do not
respond specifically to the prime. The un-
masked primes in this experiment produced
a highly significant repetition effect, whereas
in Experiment 4, they did not. The most
obvious explanation is that the present ex-
periment involved a much shorter lag (an
average of 2 intervening words) than did
Experiment 4 (an average of 90 intervening
items). If this proves to be the correct expla-
nation, then we have further evidence that
the nature of the repetition effect changes
when subjects do not respond -specifically to
the prime, because the standard repetition
 REPETITION PRIMING
effect is insensitive to lag (e.g., Feustal et al.,
1983; Jacoby & Dallas* 1981; Scarborough
et al., 1977, 1979).
Similar arguments apply to the masked
repetition effect, which we have already sug-
gested may be a very short-lived phenomenon.
The next experiment attempts to establish
this point more precisely.
Experiment 6
When the masked prime occurs immedi-
ately prior to the target, a much larger repe-
tition effect is observed compared with the
conditions of Experiment 5, where as many
as 3 words intervened. This suggests the
possibility that the masked repetition effect
is short-lived and that if sufficient items'in-
tervened, no repetition effect would be ob-
served. The present experiment was designed
to test this hypothesis. Two lag values were
used. In the first condition, 17 items were
interpolated between the prime and the target,
and in the second, only 1 item intervened.
Method
Items were constructed in the same way as in Experi-
ment 5 except that the length of the context was increased
to 19 words. The prime was located either in the second
position (a lag of 17 items), or in the second-to-last
position (a lag of 1 item). The duration of the prime was
always 60 ms, and the duration of all other items was
500 ms. The target items consisted of 60 high-frequency
words and 60 low-frequency words (drawn from the same
ranges as in Experiment S), and 120 legal nonwords. As
in Experiment S, a warning signal was provided 500 ms
before the onset of the target. Materials were counterbal-
anced across the factors of Repetition and Lag. Subjects
were told that it was important for them to read the
context items. A total of 30 volunteer undergraduates
served as subjects.
Results and Discussion
The results are shown in Table 6.
With a short lag, a masked repetition effect of
17 ms was obtained. This was significant,
F'm-m(l, 68) = 7.36, p < .01. There was a sig-
nificant effect of frequency, F'min(l, 79) =
16.53, p < .001, but there was no significant
Repetition X Frequency interaction (Fmin <
1; no significant effects were obtained in
either the subject or item analyses). Apart
from a significant effect of frequency, there
were no other significant effects in the analysis
of errors.
693
Table 6
Experiment 6: Mean Lexical Decision Times (RT
in Milliseconds) and Percentage of Errors for
Words Preceded by Masked Primes at a Short
lag (1 Item) or a Long lag (17 Items)
Item type RT % error
High-frequency words
Repeated (short lag) 445 5.7
Repeated (long lag) 460 3.3
Nonrepeated 458 5.0
Low-frequency words
Repeated (short lag) 490 14.0
Repeated (long lag) 501 11.7
Nonrepeated 511 15.3
At a lag of 17 items, however, the masked
repetition effect of only 4 ms was not signif-
icant (F'min < 1; no significant item or subject
effects were obtained). There was a significant
effect of frequency, Fmin(l, 79) = 16.04, p <
.001, but no Frequency X Repetition inter-
action (F'min < 1).
These results confirm the expectation that
the masked repetition effect dissipates rapidly
because there is no detectable effect at a lag
of 17 items (a delay of 9s). However, the
effect at a lag of 1 item (17 ms) is still well
below the values obtained in Experiments 1
and 4 (35-52 ms), where a lag of 0 was used.
If the decay is a time-dependent process, then
this suggests that most of the decay takes
place within the first second. However, it is
also possible that the decay is not time-
dependent but is the result of an interference
effect produced by the intervening items. The
present results do not permit a choice between
these alternatives.
General Discussion
The experiments reported in this article
have demonstrated that it is possible to pro-
duce repetition effects in a lexical decision
task when the prime is masked and is un-
available for conscious report. This repetition
effect differs from the normal effect in that it
is insensitive to frequency (Experiments 1, 5,
and 6) and is extremely short-lived (Experi-
ment 6). It is not produced by some sublexical
process such as letter priming, because no
repetition effects were observed for nonwords,
and there was no priming effect for graphe-
mically similar words (Experiment 2). On the
694 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS
assumption that the main effect of masking
the prime is to decrease the influence of any
possible episodic trace of the prime, it can
be concluded that the frequency attenuation
normally produced by repetition is due to
episodic influences.
Increasing the duration of the prime (and
hence making it visible) does not necessarily
restore the frequency attenuation effect. At
long lags (Experiment 4), the repetition effect
itself was so weak that there was no reliable
effect for either high- or low-frequency words
considered separately, and hence no interac-
tion could be expected. At very short lags
(Experiment 5), a highly significant repetition
effect was obtained, but there was no signifi-
cant interaction with frequency, although
there was an obvious trend in the expected
direction., These experiments differ from the
standard design in that the primes are not
presented as target items but as part of the
context of another irrelevant target word.
Hence, it appears that frequency attenuation
is more marked when the primes have been
presented as target items, as was the case in
Experiment 3, where a significant frequency
attenuation effect was obtained under the
same lag conditions as those of Experi-
ment 4.
These results can be explained by postu-
lating that there are in fact two types of
repetition effect in lexical decision tasks: a
long-term effect and a short-term effect. The
long-term effect requires that the prime be
given special emphasis or salience (e.g., by
presenting the prime as a target) and is
sensitive to the frequency of the target word.
The short-term effect requires no special sta-
tus for the prime, is insensitive to frequency,
and dissipates rapidly. We would further argue
that the long-term effect is totally mediated
by episodic factors, whereas the short-term
effect is an automatic consequence of repeated
access of the same lexical entry. This argu-
ment implies that there are no long-term
lexical effects of repetition. This is necessary
to explain why Oliphant (1983) obtained no
repetition effect at all, even though it could
be shown that the entries for the primes had
been accessed.
We now need to consider the possible
mechanisms responsible for each of these
effects. Consider first the long-term effect.
Following Oliphant's (1983) suggestion that
the effect is strategic, it could be suggested
that the locus of the episodic influence is at
the decision stage of the lexical decision task.
For example, as suggested by Jacoby and
Dallas (1981), the fact that a repeated item
accesses both a lexical entry and an episodic
trace may increase the perceived familiarity
of the word, which may in turn decrease
decision time. To explain the frequency at-
tenuation effect, we would need to postulate
that the familiarity effect is enhanced for
low-frequency words. There are several pos-
sible ways in which this may occur. For
example, high-frequency words are already
highly familiar, and hence the added famil-
iarity of a recent encounter may have little
impact. Or, it could be that the episodic
traces of low-frequency words are either
stronger or are accessed more rapidly.
To explain why an increase in familiarity
should decrease decision time, we need to
show that there is some postaccess process
that could be abbreviated of omitted. One
possibility is the postaccess orthographic
check (e.g., Forster, 1976), in which a candi-
date entry is finally checked to confirm that
it is the correct entry. This process could be
dispensed with altogether for repeated items,
because it is highly unlikely that the candidate
entry is incorrect but also happens to be the
entry for a word previously presented in the
experiment. This strategy may well depend
on the subject's awareness that items are
being repeated. Furthermore, the savings may
be greater for low-frequency words, because
the entries for these words ;take longer to
access, and hence it is more;likely that the
episodic trace will have been found in time
to have any effect. Lexical access may be so
rapid for high-frequency words that the post-
access check is well under way before the
episodic trace is found.
An alternative proposal is that the episodic
trace modifies the access process itself, al-
though the precise nature of such an effect is
obscure. Within the framework of lexical
search models, access time is controlled by
position within the search set,:and it is there-
fore difficult to see how the mere existence
of an episodic trace could influence access
time without modifying the ordering of entries
within the lexicon (the latter being ruled out
on the assumption that there are no long-
term lexical effects of repetition). Without
 REPETITION PRIMING
any strong evidence that the effect occurs
during access, the decision interpretation just
offered seems preferable.
If episodic retrieval is markedly context-
sensitive, as suggested by the encoding spec-
ificity principle (Tulving & Thomson, 1973),
then any change in the way in which the
prime and the target are presented may reduce
the accessibility of the trace of the prime,
and hence may reduce the repetition effect.
Carroll and Kirsner. (1982) reported stronger
repetition effects when related words were
presented in the same pairings on both oc-
casions, which may be interpreted as an
instance of such an effect. This notion might
also explain why the repetition effect was so
weak when the prime was presented as a
context item (Experiment 4). When the target
is presented, the episodic search may first
scan the traces of previous target items. Only
subsequently will the traces of other words
be examined. This may mean that the episodic
trace of the prime is not contacted rapidly
enough to produce a reliable repetition effect.
It is perhaps worth noting that most subjects
appeared to be aware of the repetition in this
experiment, so it could not be claimed that
the episodic trace of the prime was not
accessed; it must be that it was accessed less
efficiently.
If we are correct in claiming that long-
term repetition effects are purely episodic,
then much of the debate about the modality-
specific nature of the repetition effect loses
its significance (e,g., Morton, 1979, 1980;
Scarborough etal., 1979). Given the .contex-
tual sensitivity of episodic memory, it is no
longer surprising that presenting the prime
and the target in different modalities should
reduce the repetition effect. So, for example,
the fact that picture naming does not facilitate
subsequent word naming (Scarborough et al.,
1979) may indicate only that episodic retrieval
of the picture names was relatively slow when
the same words were presented visually, A
similar argument would apply to contrasts
between auditory and visual presentations.
The critical assumption is that episodic re-
trieval uses features of the test stimulus situ-
ation to direct its search, so that it first scans
episodic traces that are contextually linked
to the current test situation.
We now turn to a consideration of the
mechanism -underlying the short-term effect.
695
From the standpoint of a search model of
lexical access, one may be tempted to pos-
tulate that the entries for recently encountered
words are "promoted" to a higher position
in the search path. However, as noted by
Forbach et al. (1974), this would seem to
indicate stronger effects for low-frequency
words because high-frequency words may al-
ready be at the top or near the top of the
search set. Because the short-term effect is
insensitive to frequency, this proposal appears
to be ruled out, as will all other explanations
that interpret the effect in terms of the access
process. That is, the constancy of the fre-
quency effect must indicate that the access
process is unmodified, and hence the short-
term effect must also be interpreted as some
kind of postaccess effect. One possibility that
meets this constraint is to suggest that im-
mediately after an entry has been accessed,
it is left in a moderately excited state so that
information can be extracted from it more
rapidly. This readout effect may be an acci-
dental by-product of some neurophysiological
process or it may serve some function, such
as decreasing the time required for other
processing systems (such as the parser) to
extract information from the entry. The con-
cepts of opening and closing a file entry are
apt analogies from computer parlance. The
task of the lexical processor is to locate the
lexical entry appropriate to the stimulus, and
to open the entry. When the contents of the
entry are no longer required, the entry is
then closed. While an entry is in the open
condition, any subsequent access of the same
entry will be faster because the entry need
not be opened. Because this effect does not
involve any reordering of entries and only
operates after access has occurred, it should
be independent of frequency. Moreover, such
an effect would be expected to be extremely
short-lived, because processes such as parsing
and semantic interpretation are rapid, and
hence there would be no requirement to
maintain the entry in the open state beyond
a period of 1-2 s.
For the logogen model (Morton, 1980),
there is no particular difficulty in adapting
the account of long-term effects to cover the
short-term effect. Originally, it was assumed
that discharge of a logogen leads to a tem-
porary lowering of threshold proportional in
size to the original threshold level. Because
696 KENNETH I, FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS
low-frequency words have logogens with cor-
respondingly high thresholds, it follows that
larger repetition effects should occur for low-
frequency words. This account can be adapted
to cover the short-term effect provided we
assume that logogen discharge can occur
without the subject becoming aware of the
stimulus and provided we now assume that
all thresholds are reduced by the same
amount. However, it seems unlikely that both
the original account of the long-term effect
(suitably modified to incorporate episodic
influences) and this new account of the short-
term effect could coexist unless some con-
vincing account is offered for proportional
threshold reduction in the case of the long-
term effect but constant reduction for the
short-term effect.
As mentioned earlier, any episodic inter-
pretation of the long-term repetition effect
must explain why some variables that affect
the strength of the episodic trace do not affect
the strength of the repetition effect (e.g.,
Jacoby & Dallas, 1981; Jacoby & Wither-
spoon, 1982; Scarborough et al., 1977). Part
of the explanation may be a question of
timing. Episodic traces must be available
quickly enough to influence lexical decisions,
but this property may be irrelevant in an
old-new classification task. Part of the expla-
nation may be a question of sensitivity. For
example, trace strength may be critical in
discriminating whether an item has occurred
during the experiment or on some prior
occasion, but for the lexical decision task,
any trace strength above some minimal value
may be sufficient to produce an effect. Hence,
the evidence suggesting that the long-term
effect is not episodic may only indicate that
trace strength has different effects in different
tasks. It should be noted that the evidence is
not all negative, because there are some par-
allel effects for episodic and perceptual tasks
(Jacoby, 1983). In addition, the evidence
from Experiments 4 and 5 suggests a further
parallel, namely that lag effects may occur
when context primes are used.
Of particular interest is the finding that
Korsakoff patients show repetition effects de-
spite their apparent inability to recall any
details of the initial presentation (Berger,
1980; Jacoby & Withenipoon, 1982). On the
face of it, this fact appears to be a striking
refutation of the claim that repetition effects
are episodic in nature. But it may be the case
that this result shows something about the
accessibility to consciousness of episodic
traces in Korsakoff patients. Episodic traces
can be utilized effectively in carrying out
certain kinds of tasks (e.g., lexical decision)
but not others (e.g., recall).
Finally, there are a number of problems
associated with the use of masked primes
that should be considered. There have been
a number of recent studies that have shown
that masked primes are capable of producing
semantic priming effects (e.g., Balota, 1983;
Humphreys, 1981; Marcel, 1980; Marcel &
Patterson, 1978; McCauley, Parmelee, Sper-
ber,'& Carr, 1980). Much of the controversy
surrounding these studies centers on the
problem pf deciding whether subjects were
really unaware of the priming stimulus (e.g.,
Merikle, 1982). Thus, it might be suggested
that in the present series of experiments, the
masking effect was not complete and that
subjects in fact could have detected the
primes, especially after practice. This point
is actually irrelevant to the argument, because
all that is necessary is to argue that the mask
radically reduces the accessibility of the epi-
sodic trace of the prime. However, leaving
this aside, it should be noted that in the pilot
studies (Experiment 1) where subjects at-
tempted to guess the properties of the prime,
the same opportunities for improvement as a
function of practice were available, yet no
evidence of any ability to detect anything
more than the most superficial aspects of the
prime was obtained. It will be noted that the
duration of the prime in the present experi-
ments (60 ms) is rather longer than in previous
studies (less than 20 ms). This is most likely
due to the fact that a combination of forward
and backward masking was: used here. It
should be stressed that the masking effects
are in part a function of the duration of the
material presented before and after the prime
(500 ms). If these words are\ also displayed
for 60 ms, then the prime becomes much
more visible.
But the important point to note is that the
impact of the evidence reported here does
not depend on the claim that subjects were
totally unaware of the prime. Even if it could
be shbwn that they were partially aware (or
 REPETITION PRIMING
even totally aware) of the prime, it would
still be necessary to explain why the frequency
attenuation effect is absent under these con-
ditions.
It is possible that masking is actually irrel-
evant to the argument. It may turn out that
subsequent experiments show that context
items in general fail to produce frequency
attenuation effects, whether masked or un-
masked. The results of Experiment 5 are not
decisive on this point: Although the repetition
effect for low-frequency words was almost
twice as large as the effect for high-frequency
words, this difference was not reliable (it is
perhaps worth adding that precisely the same
result was obtained in an earlier experiment
that is omitted for space reasons here). How-
ever, it should be stressed that even this is a
peripheral issue, because the argument con-
cerning diminished accessibility of episodic
traces could be applied equally well to this
case.
Clearly, a complete theory of the repetition
effect will require resolution of these issues
and many others. But this should not deflect
attention from the central point of the present
argument, which is that the repetition effect
should not automatically be taken as a purely
lexical effect, and in particular, that the fre-
quency attenuation effect produced by repe-
tition does not undermine the notion of a
frequency-ordered search process.
References
Balota, D. A. (1983). Automatic semantic activation and
episodic memory encoding. Journal of Verbal Learning
and Verbal Behavior, 22, 88-104.
Becker, C. A. (1979). Semantic contexts and word fre-
quency effects in visual word recognition. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Per-
formance, 5, 252-259.
Berger, J. (1980). Determinants of verbal and non-verbal
recognition performance in Korsakoff syndrome. Un-
published honor's thesis, Monash University, Victoria,
Australia.
Besner, D., & Swan, M. (1982). Models of lexical access
in visual word recognition. Quarterly Journal of Ex-
perimental Psychology, 34, 313-325.
Carroll, M., & Kirsner, K. (1982). Context and repetition
effects in lexical decision and recognition memory.
Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 21,
55-69.
Clark, H. H. (1973). The language-as-ftxed-effect fallacy:
A critique of language statistics in psychological re-
search. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior,
12, 335-359.
697
Evett, L. J., & Humphreys, G. W. (1981). The use of
abstract graphemic information in lexical access.
Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 33,
325-350.
Feustal, T. C., Shiffrin, R. M., & Salasoo, A. (1983).
Episodic and lexical contributions to the repetition
effect in word identification. Journal of Experimental
Psychology: General, 112, 309-346.
Forbach, G. B., Stanners, R. E, & Hochhaus, L. (1974).
Repetition and practice effects in a lexical decision
task. Memory & Cognition, 2, 337-339.
Forster, K. I, (1976). Accessing the mental lexicon. In
R. J. Wales & E. Walker (Eds.), New approaches to
language mechanisms (pp. 257-287). Amsterdam:
North-Holland.
Glanzer, M., & Bowles, N. (1976). Analysis of the word
frequency effect in recognition memory. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Mem-
ory, 2, 21-31.
Gregg, V. (1976). Word frequency, recognition and recall.
In J. Brown (Ed.), Recall and recognition. London:
Wiley.
Humphreys, G. W. (1981). Direct vs. indirect tests of
the information available from masked displays: What
visual masking does and does not prevent. British
Journal of Psychology, 72, 323-330.
Hillinger, M. L. (1980). Priming effects with phonemically
similar words: The encoding-bias hypothesis reconsid-
ered. Memory & Cognition, 8, 115-123.
Jacoby, L. L. (1983). Perceptual enhancement: Persistent
effects of an experience. Journal of Experimental Psy-
chology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 9, 21-38.
Jacoby, L. L., & Dallas, M. (1981). On the relationship
between autobiographical memory and perceptual
learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,
110, 306-340.
Jacoby, L. L., & Witherspoon, D. (1982). Remembering
without awareness. Canadian Journal of Psychology,
36, 300-324.
Kirsner, K., & Smith, M. C. (1974). Modality effects in
word identification. Memory & Cognition, 2, 637-640.
Kucera, J., & Francis, W. N. (1967). Computational
analysis of present day American English. Providence,
RI: Brown University Press.
Marcel, A. J. (1980). Conscious and preconscious rec-
ognition of polysemous words: Locating the selective
effects of prior verbal context. In R. S. Nickerson
(Ed.), Attention and performance VIII (pp. 435-457).
Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Marcel, A. J., & Patterson, K. E. (1978). Word recognition
and production: Reciprocity in clinical and normal
studies. In J, Requin (Ed.), Attention and performance
VII (pp. 209-226). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
McCauley, C., Parmelee, C. M., Sperber, R. D., & Carr,
T. H. (1980). Early extraction of meaning from pictures
and its relation to conscious identification. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Per-
formance, 6, 265-276.
Merikle, P. M. (1982). Unconscious perception revisited.
Perception & Psychophysics, 31, 298-301.
Meyer, D. E., Schvaneveldt, R. W, & Ruddy, M. G.
(1974). Functions of graphemic and phonemic codes
on visual word recognition. Memory & Cognition, 2,
309-321.
698 KENNETH I. FORSTER AND CHRIS DAVIS

Morton, J. (1979). Facilitation in word recognition: ex-
periments causing change in the logogen model. In
P. A. Kolers, M. E. Wrolstad, & M. Bouma (Eds.),
Processing of visible language (pp. 259-268). New
York: Plenum Press.
Morton, J. (1980). The logogen model and orthographic
structure. In U. Frith (Ed.), Cognitive processes in
spelling (pp. 117-135). London: Academic Press. _
Oliphant, G. W. (1983). Repetition and recency effects
n
- ^a*8""" Jownal of Penology,
rw*«. r x, c^,tv,m,.oi, H
Gortese, C, & Scarborough, H
(1977). Frequency and repetition effects in lexical
memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human
Perception and Performance, 3, 1-17.
Scarborough, D. L., Gerard, L., & Cortese, C. (1979).
Accessing lexical memory: The transfer of word repe-
tition effects across task and modality. Memory &
Cognition, 7, 3-12.
Shulman, H. G., Hornak, R., & Sanders, E. (1978). The
effect of graphemic, phonetic, and semantic relation-
ships on access to lexical structures. Memory & Cog-
nttion, 6, 115-123.
stanners, R. F., & Forbach, G. B> (1973). Analysis of
ietter ^1^ ;„ wor<i recognition. Journal ofExperi-
mental Psychology, 98, 31-35.
Tfrfri ^ & Thoms(jni D M (1573) Encodjng sped.
fidtv and rettieval
processing in episodic memory.
Psychological Review, 80, 352-373.
Received April 27, 1983
Revision received April 20, 1984 •

Instructions to Authors

The journal publishes long, integrative articles containing multiple experiments and extensive theoretical
development, including quantitative models and computer simulations where appropriate. Alternative con-
tributions may be quite briefer very long and could include letters, comments on previous articles or books,
problems with theoretical conclusions or empirical designs of earlier publications, replies to criticism, and
brief reports of new work in cases where this new work will not be published in other journals of general
circulation. For further information on content, authors should refer to the editorial in the January 1983
issue of the Journal (Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 1-2). For information on the other three JEP journals, authors
should refer to editorials in those journals.
Authors should prepare manuscripts according to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological
Association (3rd ed.). All manuscripts must include an abstract of 100-150 words typed on a separate sheet
of paper. Typing instructions (all copy must be double-spaced) and instructions on the preparation of tables,
figures, references, metrics, and abstracts appear in the Manual. Also, all manuscripts are subject to editing
for sexist language.
APA policy prohibits an author from submitting the same manuscript for concurrent consideration by
two or more journals. APA policy also prohibits duplicate publication, that is, publication of a manuscript
that has already been published in whole or in substantial part in another journal. Also, authors of manuscripts
submitted to APA journals are expected to have available their raw data throughout the editorial review
process and for at least 5 years after the date of publication.
Blind reviews are optional, and authors who wish blind reviews must specifically request them when
submitting their manuscripts. Each copy of a manuscript to be reviewed blind should include a separate
title page with authors' names and affiliations, and these should not appear anywhere else on the manuscript.
Footnotes that identify the authors should be typed on a separate page. Authors should make every effort
to see that the manuscript itself contains no clues to their identities.
Manuscripts should be submitted in quadruplicate (the Original and three photocopies), and all copies
should be clear, readable, and on paper of good quality. Authors should keep a copy of the: manuscript to
guard against loss.
Mail manuscripts and address all correspondence at all stages of handling to the Editor-elect, Henry L.
Roediger III, Department of Psychology, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907.
For the other JEP journals, authors should submit manuscripts (also in quadruplicate) to one of the
editors at the following addresses: Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, Sam Glucksberg, Department
of Psychology, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey 08544; Journal of Experimental Psychology:
Human Perception and Performance, William Epstein, Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin,
W. J. Brogden Psychology Building, 1202 West Johnson Street, Madison, Wisconsin 53706; Journal of
Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, Donald S. Blough, Department of Psychology, Brown
University, Providence, Rhode Island 02912. When one of the editors believes a manuscript is clearly more
appropriate for an alternative journal of the American Psychological Association, the editor may redirect
the manuscript with the approval of the author.

View publication stats