Sausset, S. , Lambert, E. & Olive, T.
Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition et l'Apprentissage (CeRCA), CNRS UMR 6234, University of Poitiers, Poitiers, France
This study investigated the influence of graphomotor demands on the time course of spelling. We hypothesized that with low graphomotor demands, the syllables of a word are processed before writing the word, whereas with high graphomotor demands, each syllable is processed just before being written down. The experiment involved four conditions with increasing graphomotor demands: lowercase script, uppercase script, uppercase script with large letters, uppercase script with large letters without visual feedback. Participants copied three times successively 2- and 3-syllable words. We measured the latencies before copies 2 and 3, and duration of the inter-letter intervals within the first syllable and at the boundary before the second syllable. With low graphomotor demands, the latencies were longer than when the demands were higher; the effect of the number of syllables was significant only for the low demanding conditions. The between-syllable inter-letter interval was longer than the within-syllable inter-letter interval, particularly with high graphomotor demands. The findings indicate that with low graphomotor demands syllables are processed before graphomotor execution of the word. With high graphomotor demands each syllable is processed just before being written. These findings are interpreted in a cascading model.