The Effects of Feature Type on Semantic Priming of Picture Naming in Normal Speakers

The aim of this study was to investigate the roles of features on conceptual activation.  A picture naming paradigm was employed to measure speech reaction time (SRT) during feature-to-concept activation.  Forty-seven older adults completed the priming task twice with an ISI of 200msec and 600msec. Results indicate that regardless of semantic category, distinctive feature primes resulted in the fastest SRT compared to shared features, combined distinctive and shared features, and neutral primes.  The results indicate that as stated in the Conceptual Structure Account (Tyler & Moss, 2001; Taylor et al., 2007) distinctive features have a privileged role in concept activation.