Reading Words Aloud and Language Subsystems

Practice flashcards covering language subsystems, types of acquired dyslexia, and the components of the Dual Route Model of reading.

Frequency effect

The phenomenon where words encountered more often are identified and read aloud more quickly than those encountered less frequently.

Regularity effect

A phenomenon where regular words (e.g., 'hint', 'mint') are read more quickly than irregular words (e.g., 'pint').

Surface dyslexia

An acquired neuropsychological disorder characterized by difficulty reading irregular words, often resulting in pronouncing them as regular words (e.g., pronouncing 'deaf' to rhyme with 'leaf').

Phonological dyslexia

An acquired neuropsychological disorder characterized by the inability to read pronounceable non-words, though the ability to read irregular words remains intact.

Deep dyslexia

A disorder causing difficulty reading non-words, irregular words, and regular words, often involving semantic errors and better performance with highly imageable words.

Dual Route Model

A model suggesting three pathways for reading where the final pronunciation depends on which route (lexical or sub-lexical) finishes processing first.

Lexical route

A reading pathway that involves accessing representations stored in long-term memory, such as the orthographic and phonological lexicons.

Sub-lexical route

An indirect pathway that does not involve the lexicon, assuming pronunciation based on grapheme-to-phoneme conversion.

Lexicon

The mental dictionary containing stored information about words.

Orthographic knowledge

Visual knowledge regarding the appearance and structure of letters and words.

Phonological knowledge

Knowledge concerning the sounds associated with letters and words.

Semantic knowledge

Knowledge relating to the meanings of words.

Semantic priming

A process where the meaning of a word is influenced or facilitated by other conceptually related words.

Grapheme

Individual letters or combinations of letters that represent individual sounds in a word.

Route A

A sub-lexical route in the Dual Route Model that converts individual letters (graphemes) into individual sounds (phonemes).

Route B

A lexical route that goes from letters on a page to a long-term memory representation in the orthographic lexicon, which is then mapped onto the phonological lexicon.

Route C

A lexical route involving the semantic system, accessed after the orthographic lexicon to interpret a word by its meaning before pronunciation.

Word Similarity

A variable in word recognition where similar words compete with each other to be identified or used.

Age of Acquisition

The impact of the timing of word learning, where words acquired early in life are typically identified and remembered better than those acquired later.

Semantic errors

Occur when a patient understands the general idea of a word but cannot identify it specifically, such as seeing the name of one animal but saying another.