Reicher (1969): Word Superiority Effect

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Reicher (1969) Word Superiority Effect

• Dr. Timothy Bender
• Psychology Department
• Missouri State University
• Springfield, MO 65897

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Reicher (1969) explored whether or not we use
parallel processing in the visual sensory memory.
His participants were to identify a single letter
that appeared in one of four possible locations.
The letter appeared either alone, in a
four-letter word, or in a four-letter nonword.
All of the stimuli were masked, making it
difficult to identify them.
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If we process the letters in a word in a serial
fashion (one letter at a time), it should be more
difficult to identify a letter in a word than
that letter by itself. If we process the letters
in a word in parallel (all of the letters at
once), it should be just as easy to identify a
letter in a word as it is to identify that letter
by itself. The nonword condition allowed Reicher
to see if there was something unique about
processing a letter in a word vs. that letter in
a mixed group of letters.
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The results strongly support the idea that we
engage in parallel processing in iconic memory.
However, Reicher (1969) is most often cited for
an additional interesting result which we will
discuss after the demonstration.
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In this demonstration, you will see a series of
24 stimuli. The stimuli will be either a
four-letter word, the same four letters in a
mixed order, or a single letter. The single
letter will appear in any of the four letter
positions from the word condition. The stimulus
will appear for about 66 milliseconds and will be
followed immediately by a pattern of lines.
Along with the pattern mask you will see a
choice of two letters above one of the four
letter positions. Your task is to choose which of
the two letters appeared in that location in the
original stimulus.
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The following is an example of a stimulus from
the word condition. A will appear first near
the center of the screen, then the stimulus and
mask will occur.
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Which letter?
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The following is an example of a stimulus from
the nonword condition. A will appear first near
the center of the screen, then the stimulus and
mask will occur.
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Which letter?
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The following is an example of a stimulus from
the letter condition. A will appear first near
the center of the screen, then the stimulus and
mask will occur.
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Which letter?
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The first stimulus will appear on the next
slide. You will need a response sheet with the
numbers 1 - 24 listed in a column. For each
stimulus, please choose one of the two letter
choices, even if you think it is just a guess.
Give it your best guess.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? The next screen is the next
stimulus.
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Which letter? You will score your performance
next.
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You will have three scores, one for each type of
stimulus. You will first figure your Letters
score. Give yourself 1 point for each of the
following that you answered correctly. 2. L 8.
V 13. G 19. T 6. C 12. V 17. Y 23.
D Figure out the mean score for the class.
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You will now figure your Nonword score. Give
yourself 1 point for each of the following that
you answered correctly. 3. V 7. Y 15. D 20.
C 4. G 10. T 18. L 22. V Figure out the mean
score for the class.
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• You will now figure your Word score. Give
  yourself 1 point for each of the following that
  you answered correctly.
• Y 9. D 14. C 21. V
• 5. T 11. L 16. V 24. G
• Figure out the mean score for the class.

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If your class performed similarly to the
participants in Reicher (1969) you scored better
in the Word condition than in either the Nonword
or Letter conditions. In other words, Reicher
found that it is easier to recognize a letter in
a simple word than it is to recognize that letter
alone or in a nonword! This has been called the
Word Superiority Effect.
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If your classs did not show the Word
Superiority Effect, do not worry. Reichers
participants performed the task as individuals in
a much better controlled environment than the
classroom. Also, they were pretested to determine
the optimal presentation speed for each
participant.
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One other difference between this demonstration
and Reichers (1969) research is that in addition
to the single word, nonword, and letter
conditions, Reicher used two-word, two-nonword,
and two-letters conditions. In other words, his
participants had to pay attention to 8 different
positions on the screen rather than just 4. You
are strongly encouraged to read the original
article for a better understanding of the
research.
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One popular attempt to explain the Word
Superiority Effect is the interactive activation
model of McClelland Rumelhart (1981).
Basically, they suggest that both feature
processing and word processing provide additional
support to letter processing. Therefore, when a
letter appears in a word, the letter is
recognized more easily than when the letter
appears alone or in a nonword.
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References McClelland, J. L., Rumelhart, D. E.
(1981). An interactive activation model of
context effects in letter perception Part 1. An
account of basic findings. Psychological
Review, 88, 375-407. Reicher, G. M. (1969).
Perceptual recognition as a function of
meaningfulness of stimulus material. Journal of
Experimental Psychology, 81, 275-280.