Sound-to-print consistency of picture labels was manipulated in five experiments to investigate whether phonological codes constrain the selection of orthographic codes in written picture naming. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants wrote down picture names which were inconsistent or consistent in the phono-orthographic mapping defined either at the level of the word unit, i.e., heterographic homophones versus nonhomophones (Experiment 1), or at the sublexical level (Experiment 2). In neither experiment did phonographic consistency affect written latencies. Although more errors were observed for inconsistent than for consistent picture names, the observation of a similar error pattern in an untimed written picture naming (control) task suggests that errors resulted from inaccurate orthographic knowledge. In Experiment 3, the position of the inconsistent units within the picture name (initial versus middle or final) was manipulated. The results indicated that only initial inconsistencies affected written latencies. Ruling out the hypothesis that this finding merely results from the fact that handwriting starts before the orthographic encoding of the word endings, Experiments 4 and 5 showed that middle or Final inconsistencies influenced written latencies in a spelling-to-dictation task. The findings are discussed as suggesting that the build-up of orthographic activation from pictures is phonologically constrained through the sequential operation of sublexical conversion.
Do phonological codes constrain the selection of orthographic codes in written picture naming?
