Abstract
In the present set of experiments the effects of negative priming in word fragment completion were studied. Subjects were given primes that were orthographically related to the target fragments in an attempt to hinder their ability to solve the fragments. To determine whether negative priming is a result of implicit or explicit remembering, the modality of the prime presentation and the duration of the fragment presentation were both varied. Finally, the type of processing (conceptually-vs. perceptually-driven) was manipulated to determine the effects on the proportion overlap phenomenon. In all three experiments, it was found that orthographically similar primes caused memory blocks in a word fragment completion task. In Experiment 2, it was found that negative priming in word fragment completion involves both an implicit and an explicit component. When the time to process the fragments was limited, negative priming still occurred when the primes were presented visually, indicating implicit remembering. When sufficient time was given to process the fragments, negative priming occurred when the primes were presented aurally, indicating explicit remembering. The results of Experiment 3 do not support the assumption that the effects of proportion overlap are due to conscious retrieval strategies. In addition, it appears that proportion overlap may affect negative priming but have no effect on positive priming.
Tindell, Deborah Rene (1994). Negative priming in word fragment completion: implicit or explicit?. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from
https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -1994 -THESIS -T5882.