Verbal Perception and the Word Length Effect

Retrieved-context models have played a crucial role in the understanding of serialposition effects in free recall. In this paper, a simple model in that class is proposed and tested against the case of word-length experiments. In recent years, standard interpretations of the word-length effect have been undermined by a series of experimental results, culminating with data that display an inversion of the effect for mixed lists. The model discussed in this paper predicts the experimental behavior as an effect of the different level of localization of short and long words in semantic space. Events corresponding to the recognition of a nonlocal word have a clustering property in phase space, which facilitates associative retrieval. The standard word-length effect arises directly from this property, and the inverse effect from its breakdown. The theory predicts that the contiguity effect should be stronger for shorter words. Several other predictions are listed, and experiments are proposed to further test the model. Finally, a possible interpretation of the results is discussed.