Juan L., L. 1 , M, L. 1 , Carlos, &. 2 , Almudena, G. 1 & Sergio, V. 1
1 Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de Málaga; Málaga, Spain
2 Universidad de La Laguna
The deficit of the dyslexic reader is shown unambiguously in error and times measures during the reading of pseudowords. Thus, it is an implicit assumption that deficit is basically located at decoding phase. However, the inhibitory effect of PSF might show up a complementary view. This effect consists on words composed of frequent syllables produce longer reaction times and more errors than words with less frequent syllables (Carreiras, Álvarez, & de Vega, 1993). The high-frequency syllables are shared by more words so extra- time is needed to deactivate the lexical neighbors. Therefore, a lexical decision task containing a classical FSP paradigm implies two processes at least, the activation (decoding phase) and the inhibition of lexical candidates. If this is true, then dyslexic readers must show a stronger inhibitory effect than normal readers because they are slower decoders but they could also be slower inhibitors. Dyslexics and control readers from two reading levels (7 & 9 yrs) received a lexical decision task, containing a classical FSP paradigm (high/low lexical frequency words by high/low syllable frequency words). First, the interaction between lexical frequency and syllable frequency factors were significant, and on low-frequency words condition a strong inhibitory effect was found. This result is common in adult samples but it has been never reported for these school levels. More interesting, while the third order interaction between lexical frequency by syllable frequency by reading level did not reach the significance, these two factors by group factor (dyslexics/controls) was statistically significant. The inhibitory effect showed that dyslexics deficits are no restricted to the grapheme-phoneme conversion phase, but it is a wider phonological deficit as current theories have pointed out.