Perceptuo-motor interactions across and within phonemic categories

Past studies have demonstrated that reaction times in producing CV syllables are modulated by audio distractors participants hear while preparing their responses. Galantucci et al. [5] showed that participants respond faster on trials with identical response-distractor pairs than when the response and distractor differ in voicing or articulator. The dynamical model of phonological planning developed in [9] attributes these differences in reaction times to phonological parameters of a distractor exciting or inhibiting the planning of a response. A so far untested prediction of the model is that within-category phonetic variation in the voicing parameter of the distractors still gives rise to congruency effects of the articulator. We report new results which show effects of response-distractor articulator congruency for distractors with varying voice onset times. These results extend previous findings by pursuing predictions concerning withincategory variability of distractor stimuli.