Abu El Adas, S. & Levi, S.
New York University
Research suggests that phonological knowledge and lexical-semantic information are the two main linguistic factors affecting talker processing. To explore the effect of these two linguistic factors, researchers have examined the contribution of lexical-semantic information and of phonological familiarity by manipulating either the type of stimuli used (e.g. phonologically similar languages, reversed speech, nonwords) or the properties of the listeners through an examination of the contribution of reading ability, since reading impairment is linked to impaired phonological representations. These studies have found that individuals with poorer phonological processing also have poorer talker processing. In the current study, we simultaneously test the contribution of these two linguistic factors on talker processing by manipulating lexical status (words/nonwords) and phonotactic probability (high/low). In addition to stimulus manipulations, we also test individual differences in reading ability, as poor phonological awareness skills are linked to reading impairment. While previous studies have used a talker identification task, the current study explores whether similar results can be obtained with a discrimination task that does not require listeners to store information about the talker in long-term memory. Twenty-four native speakers of American English completed an AX discrimination task and a battery of phonological awareness and reading skills tasks. Reaction time results revealed that listeners were faster when listening to words than nonwords, but also that the difference between words and nonwords was greater for items with high phonotactic probability compared to low phonotactic probability. Sensitivity (A') revealed no effects of lexical status or phonotactic probability, but did reveal that listeners with higher reading scores were more sensitive to talker differences. These findings are consistent with previous work that has found that individuals with reading impairments exhibit reduced talker processing on talker identification tasks.