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19t6, voL I 15,No. 3, 281-294
Picturesin Sentences:
UnderstandingWithout Words
Mary C. Potter
Judith F. Kroll
Massachusetts
Institute of Technology
Mount Holyoke College
BetsyYachzel,ElisabethCarpenter,and JanetSherman
MassachusetsInstitute of Technology
SUMMARY
To understanda sentence,the meaningsof the wordsin the sentencemustbe retrieved
and combined.Are thesemeaningsrepresentedwithin the languagesystem(the lexical
hypothesis)or are they representedin a generalconceptualsystemthat is not restricted
to language(the conceptualhypothesis)?To erraluatethesehypotheses,sentenceswere
presentedin whicha pictued objectreplaceda word(rebussentences).
Previousresearch
hasshowuthat isolatedpicturesand wordsare processedequallyrapidly in conceptual
tasls, but that picturesare markedlyslowerthan wordsin usks requiring ledcal access.
The lexical hypothesiswould thereforelead one to expectthat rebussentenceswill be
relativelydifrcult, whereasthe conceptualhypothesiswould predia that rebussentences
would be rathereasy.
wereshownusingrapid serialvisuai presentation(RSVP)at a rate of l0 or
Sentences
12wordspersecond.With onesetof materials(ExperimentsI ard 2), readerstook longer
tojudgetheplausibility ofrebussentences
thanall-wordsentences,
althoughtheaccuraca
ofjudgmentandof recallweresimilar for thetwo formats.With two neq/setsof materiais
(Experiments3 and 5), rebusand all-word sentences
werevirtually equivalentexceptin
onesircumstance:whena picture replacedthe noun in a familiar phrasesuchasseedless
grapes.In contrast,whenthe taskrequiredovertnamingofthe rebuspicturein a sentencecontexqlatencyto namethe picturewasmarkedlylongerthan to namethe correspondingword,andthe appropriateness
ofthe sentence
contextaffectedpicturenaming
but not word naming(Experiment4).
The resultsfail to supporttheoriesthat placeword meaningsin a specialized
lexical
entry.Instead,the resultssuggest
that the lexicalrepresentation
of a noun or flamiliar
noun phraseprovidesa pointerto a nonlinguisticconceptualsystem,and it is in that
systemthat the mganiqgofa sentence
is constructed.
In what part or module of the cognitive system is the semantic information about a noun stored?Is it stored in a lexicon
that is part of a linguistic system, or is the meaning simply a part
of a general-purposc conceptual'system? These two theoretical
possibilities place the division between linguistic and nonlinguistic thought at fundamentally different points. The contrast
can be highiighted by considcring two ways in which the meanings of words might be put together in seutence processing According to one approach,a word's representationin the lexicon
providesonly a pointerto the relevantcoucept, and the composition ofword meaningsoccurs in a general-purposeconceptual
system. In this view, a person reading or listening to a sentence
activates conceptual information about each content word and
builds a representationofthe sentence'smeaning in the conceprual system. According to the other approach, core semantic
information is included in the lexical representation itself. The
Iexical representation is one component of the linguistic system, which is a modular processor separate from the generalpurposeconceptualsystem.Sentencecomprehensionis viewed
as including two distinct although possibly overlappingstages:
semantic composition, which takes place in the linguistic sys-
tem and yields the sentence'sliteral meaning; and pragmatic
interpretation of this meaning in the genera.l-purpose
conceptual system.
Although many cognitive psychologistsfind the couceptual
approach congenial, linguists and psycholinguists have focused
on the linguistic system, and for the rnost part they explicitly
or implicitly accept some version of the lexical approach. One
reason is that language-specificlexicai representationsrarher
than the underlying concepts are involved in some syntacuc
constraints. For exampie, Mttdchen is the German word for a
young woman, but it is neuter and takes the neuter anicie
das, the anaphoric pronoun es, and so forth. In English. the
singular concept scrisors has a plural name. Gender and number agreement in such casesis determined by the lexicai form
rather than the concept. Another exampie is verb subcaregorization: for instance. eal c:ln be used both transitiveiv and
intransitiveiy (He ate), but devour can only be use6 glnnsiuveiy
(rHe devoured).Thesedifferencesin synta.nseem to havelittle
or nothing to do with differencesin the concepts of the contrasting verbs.Such examplesshow that the lexical representation is not simply replaced by a noniinguistic concept dunng
281
282
POTTER KROLL V{CHZEL CARPENTER. SHERMAN
comprehension,at least trot before the syntactic anaiysishas
beencompieted.
A division betweeninformation in the lexicon and in a general purposeconceptualsystemis also motivated by semantic
theory.Someaspectsof sentencesqsaningseemto follow directly from word meanings,whereasothen depend on lacts
about the worid. The classicdistinction betweenanomaly and
faisehoodis a casein point My sisteris manied to a bachelor
is anomalousbecauseof the contradiction betweenthe meanings of manied and bachelonwhereastVy sisteris manied to
Henry VIII is factually false. Implications of sentencesalso
s€emto fall irto nro categories:thoseentailmentsthat follow
from word meaning5Q{e wasmurderedimplies that he is dead)
and thosc inferencesthat are bascdou gcn€ralknowledge(.I/e
wasborn in 1600implies that he is dcad).Thescand other oh'
that somecorefeaturesof meaningare represervationssuggest
sentedin the lexicon and are usedin arriving at a literal interprior to or independent
pretationofthe sentence,
ofretrievalof
generaipurposeknowledge(for reviews,seeAkmajian, Demers,& Harnish,1979,Clark & Clark, 1977,and J. D. Fodor,
197'7).
This studyis an initial anempt to distinguishempirically berweenthe conceptualand lexical approachesto the processing
of word meanings.The methodwe usedwasto presentwrinen
sentenccin whichpicturesreplacedoneortwo concretenouns
(rebussentences).
The reasonfor usingpictruesasword substiwords
and pictures,whel presentedin isolation.
tutesis that
rwo
havethe following propenies.
l. Wrinen wordsare namedmore than 200 ms fasterthan
matchedpictures(e.9, Caneil, 1886; Fraisse.1960: Paivio.
1975).Naminglatencyis an
1971,1978:Potter& Fauiconer,
(Forster,
a lexicalrepresentation
indexof relativedmeto access
& Kroll. 1976)and thus the extra200 ms
l98l: Frederiksen
requiredto namea pictureindicatesa 100-msdelayin retrieving theappropriatelexicalentry.
2. The samepicturesandwordsare understoodequallyfast
(if anything picturesare faster)in a vanety of taskssuch as
categoriangthe itemsor judgingtheir relevanceto a preceding
(e.9.,Banks& Floru 1977:'
Poner,i 979;Poner& Faulsentence
coner,1975;Poner,So,vou Eckardt,& Feldman.1984:Potter.
Vaiian,& Faulconer,I 977;$ssdg"ss, I 980. I 984).
Thesefindingsindicate that picrured objeas and the correspondingwordssharea common conceptualrepresentation
thar is separatetiom the lexiconitseif.and that written words
and picturesaccessthis concepual representationequally rag
idly.
if the lexicalentry
Turningnow to sentence
comprehension,
This researchwassupponed iu part by Nauonal ScienceFoundauon
Grants BNS77-Z-5543,BNS8G'2-J453,and BNS83-t8156 to the first
author, and by Dettnsc Adfaoccd Rescarch Projecs Agency Conract
MDA903-764441 to the first and second authors. We thank Viryinia
Valian.Jancilen Hunenlochcr.S,'en LirDa Gay Snodgrass Irvin RocK
and Robet Welker for their commeots aod Linda Lombardi for assisting in the research.
Correspondenceconccrning this article should be addressedto Marv
C. Poner.Depanment of Brain and Cognitive Sciences.El0-032. MassachusensInstitute of Technology,Cambndge. Massachusens02139.
containssemanticinformationthat is usedin arrivingat anini(coreinformationthat is distial interpretationof the sentetrce
tinct from that in the all-purposeconceptualrepresentation),
a rebuspictureshouldimposea deiayin seathenencountering
tenceprocessingof about 200 ms. On the other hand, if the
meaningof a word is representedeutirely in the all-purgcse
conceptualsystem,a picturewouldprovideequallyrapid access
to that information,andthereshouldbe no paniculardifrmltv
or delayin understandinga rebussentence.(This predicaon
restson the strongassumptionthat the strangelook of a rebus
s€nterce,the difEculty of recognizingmixtures of picturesaad
words,andothersimilar factorswouid not producedisruptious
or delaysin processingSuch eff'ects,if presengwould bias the
resulBin favorofthe lexical hypothesis.)
To makethe task of reading.andrespondingto rebussentencesand to matchedall-word sentencessufrciently diftcult
andtime constrainedto reveaiany disruptiveeffectof the recus
(RSVP)wasused(F-'rpictures,rapidserialvisualpresentation
steq1970;seePotteq1984,for a review).In RSVP,eachwsrd
at thesamelocation,so :1tt
appears
successively
of a sentence
are neededand the rateof readingis uncer
no eyemovements
control.
experimenter
To summarizethe logic of the fint experiment.if the lenal
ofa picturedcb
approachiscorrect,thelexicalrepresentation
ject wouidhaveto beretrievedin orderto fit thewordsubstinre
into the s€ntence.Becauselexical retrievai is substan;eiiy
slowerfor picturesthan for written words.a markeddisrupuoa
processing
would beexpectedunderthe time-linuof sentence
thesemanticccrming conditionsof RSVPreading I[, however,
ponentof thelexiconconsistssimpiyof a pointerto theconc{=tual system,thenrebussentences
shouidbe readilyundersrocri
becausean appropriatepicture would point to the sameccaceptasthenounir replaced.
Experiment I
processing
whena picturereplaces
a no"'
To assess
sentence
werestudied:(a)a speeded
two responses
decisionaboutplaus(e.g.,Lever
of thesentence
biliry that requiredcomprehension
& Kempen.1975),and (b) immediaterecallof the sentene.
previous
work(e.9,Aaronson,1976:Green.1911)hzi
Because
shownthat readen may adopt different strategiesfor compr:hensionandfor recall,threegroupsof subjeaswerecompar*
group,a recall-oniygroup,and a coEa comprehension-oniy
prehension-plus-recail
group.The comprehension-oniy
gror=
madeplausibilitydecisions,the recall-onlygroupwrote dog:
groupdid both.Tthesentence,
andthecomprehension-recall
pres€nce
or absence
ofa picturein thesentence,
theplausibiii;;
of the senteace,and the lengxhof the sentencewere vans,
within subjects.
The rateof presentationwassetat 12 wordsper second'o+
causepilot work showedthat RSVP reading at that rate \rat
possibiebut moderatetydifficuit. The rate (equivalentto il.
wordsper minute) is more than twice that of tvpical coileg:
readers.
.Vethod
Sublects. Forqvcollege-agemen and women volunreeniwere pard ir
panicrpadngin the experimenr: 16 were assignedto the comprehe-
283
PICTURES IN SENTENCES
sion-recall group, 8 to tbc comprehension-only group, and 16 to the
recail.only group.
Mateials. The main experiment consisted of 32 sentences,8 s€ntcncesofeach offour lengtbg 8, 10, 12, or 14 words. The sentenccs
wried widely in zubject mancr and grammatical structure; all iucluded
at least one coocrrtc, picnuable noun, whosc scrial position variedTherc werc lour vcrsions of each sentence; format (rcbus vs. all-word)
was crosscd with plausibility. Sentenc€s were madc implausible by
changing one or two words, gsr'"lly the last word ia tbc scntence. In all
cirs€s!scntenc€ plausibility hinged on thc last word. For instance, in the
implansiblc versioo moon replaced lightbulb in thc followiog scntence:
Judy neededthe stoolto reach the lightbulb. In the rebus venion ofeach
scnteucg stool was rcplaced by a picturc of a stool. Other examples are
giveo in the Appeodix"
Eight additional scntsoccs x'cre intcrmixed with.the 32 main scutcoccs. All *rre 12words in leo$h and hdfwcte plausiblc halfimplausible. Thcy u'tre dcsigncd to ass6s thc effect of presenting 0, l, or 2
picturcs, so each scotence included at least wo pisturable nouns. In
diferent vcrsions, both, ooe, or neithcrword uas replaced by a picture.
Thcre wsre 6 practice scntcnccs.
Thc picturcs uscd in thc rebus s€otencs were line drawings from a
larger sct "sed by Potter and Faulconcr (1975). The sentences were
typed in lowercasc letters and tbcn photographed, one word or picture
to a framq on l6-mm higb-coutrast double negative fiIm, so that the
pictures and words were whitc oD a gnry background. The subjecs sat
3 m from the scrcsu; a ssrco-lener word and the largest dimension of
thc picture each subtcnded about 4.4'. A warning signal consisting ofa
rorrrofasterisks appcared for 83 ms, 333 ms before eacb scutence.
The rationale for the experiment dcpeuded on the assumption that,
in isolation, the pictures to be used in thc rebus scntence wouid take
longer to namc than the corresponding words, but would bc as easy to
pcrceive and undertand as the words. PretesB ofthe rebus pictures and
corresponding words wetc carried out to test thosc assumptions, There
were two groups of 16 subjecrseach. In the 6nt group, naming latency
flor the picturcs and words was measured. A waroing row ofastcrisks
preccded tbc stimulus item by 500 mq the irem appeared for 83 ms,
precededand followedby a row of symbols(to mimic the maskingeffect
o[RSVP words in the main experiment). In the secondgroup, time to
understand a word or picture was a\s€ssd using the category-matching
taskofPottcrand Fauiconer( 1975)and others.A written supcrordinate
c.:ltegoryname \r€s prescnted 667 ms beforc the arget word or picturc
(which was maskedas in the naming condition), and the subject'stask
erasto deside whether the object narued or picnrred was a member of
that category.
In the naming group, subjects werc instructed to n2ne the word or
picnrre as rapidly as possiblc; a voice key measured reactiou time (RT)
lrom tbc onsct of the stimulus. In the category-matching group, subjects
werc instructcd to presnone reponsc key if the word or picnrre reffi
to a member of the specifredsuperordinate category G.E,,fumiture: gardening equipmerr), and to pressthe other ifit did not. The category and
item matched on halfthe trials. Match-mismarch was counterbalanced
acrossfrlms. so that each item u.asseen once in each of the four combinations of match-mismatch and picture-word form.
The resrlts ofthe pretests,showu in Table l, replicate those ofPoner
and Faulconcr( 1975)in all importaot respects.In the naming taslc the
word advantagcof 218 ras was significant,(1, 15) = 14.17,p < .01.
Altbough there were 99oerro6 in picnrre naming only 39owere total
misunderstandings of tbc picture; the rest were semantically closc respons€s,such as car lor bus. In the category-matching ush there was
ao significant difference between pictures and worG in RR or erron.
These pretest results show that the critical picnrres and words mer the
requireneats for use in Experiment l: In isolation, the pictures ro be
used in rcbus scntetrcestook substantially longer to name than tbe corrcsponding words but were understoodjust as rapidly and accuratel-v.
Equipment. A l6-mm variable-speed projector was used to pr6€nt
tbe stimuli. A white transpareut square appeard iu the lower left corner
of the frame with tbe last word of each sentence, and a photocell activated by tbe ligbt spot started a pair of clock counten. The subject
prcssed one of two resporue buttous to indicate whether the senteuce
uas plausible; RT was measured to the nearest millisecond.
Design and procedure. Each subject saw a set of sentencesin which
all-word and rebus formats and plausibleand implausible senrencesap.
peared equally often, counterbaianced over ficur sentencelenghs. There
were two blocks, each consisting of 16 sentences(plus fillen), which
comprised a complcte replication of the two formats, wo plausib{iries,
and lour lengths" The order of sentenceswas randomized within block
and that sameorderwas uscd in all conditions. The four versions ofeach
scntetrceurcrc counterbalanced over four films, each seen by a quarter
ofthe subjecs in eachofthe groups.
The comprehcnsion-recallgroup first decided whether the sentence
wasplausible(by pressingone oftwo keys)and then wrote it down. The
comprehcnsion-only group and the recail-only group pertbrmed one or
the othcf, task, respectively. All groups were told lhat some senteDces
would be plausible and others implausible and that pictures wouid replacewords in somescntences.
Results
In initial analyses"the comprehension-recallgroup's resuits
were comp:ued with the recall-only group (for sentencerecail)
and with the comprehension-onlygroup (for plausibiliqvjudgments).In most comparisonsthere were no differencesbe!*een
groups,so only the combined resultsare repofted except when
group differences were found. In no casedid the rebus variable
interact with group. A breakdown of the results by groups is
shown in Table 2 (for the plausibility judgment) and Figure I
(for recall). To summarize the overall resuls briefl-v,subjects
took 1,345ms to make a decision about the plausibility of sentencesand made .12 erron (weighted mean of the rwo groups).
Thble I
hetestfor Experimmt l: Mean Reaction Times (in tVilliseconds), Standard Deviations, and,Error Rates
in Naming or Categorizing Pictures and Written Words
Pictures
Words
Group
RT
.tD
Naming
Category-matching
Yes
No
.V
752
ol
.09
534
lr8
.05
.09
.07
646
668
657
648
6s2
650
I 19
Rf,
Word advantage
SD
ol
108
168
RT
.0r
2r8
.08
t)
2
-t6
-7
-.06
02
-02
.01
.09
284
POTTER KROLL Y\CHZEL CARPENTER SHERMAN
Table2
ExperimentsI and2: MeanReaction Ti.mes(in Milliseconds),StandardDa'iations, and Error Rates
in JudgingthePlausibilityof RebusandAll-WordSentences
Plausiblc
Rebus
Group
Kf
Words
.tD
Comprehcnsion-recall
Comprehensiononlv
r,310
| )6)
847
463
Comprcheusion-recall
1,364
626
Implausible
Rebus
SD
,10
.06
RT
Words
RT
SD
ExpqrimentI
t,261
508
,ra
I,133
342
.06
1,520
t.457
676
539
.lI
Expcrimcat2
476
.07
r.529
591
.18
t.233
In immediatelyrecallingthe sentences,
l47oof the wordswere
omined or recalledincorrectly.(In most cases,the gisrof the
wasrecailedcorrecrly;morewill besaidaboutthe nasentence
ture of the recallerrorsin the final discussion.)
Therefore.as
intended.readingwasmoderatelydifficult but not dramatically
imparred-Rebussentences
could be undentoodand recalled
almost-but not quite-as easilyasall-wordserrtences.
Recall
errorsw€resiighrtyhigher(by l.4Zo)for rherebussenrences,
but
thedifference
wasnot significant.It took subjects103mslonger
to judgethe plausibriityof rebuss€ntences
than all-wordsentences(a differencenot obtainedin Experimens3 and 5 with
newsetsof sentences),
but therewasno diferencein the accuracy of the decision.showingthat a picture doesprovidethe
informationnecessary
to understand
a sentence
in whichit ap.
pears.Detarlsof theseand orheranalysesfoilow.
Analysesof variance(,lNovas)werecarriedout for subjects
(F,) on themeansoftheir responses
to therwosenrences
of the
samelength.formal and piausibility,a-ndlor sentences
(Fz)on
the meansof thesubjectswho sawa glvensentence
in thesame
formatandplausibiiirycondition.FortheRT analyses.
onlycorrect responses
wereinciuded:empty ceilswererepiacedusing
Winer's procedure(Winer, 1962).Correct rsponses grearer
than rwo standarddeviations(SA) from a subject,smeanRT
(4%of all responses,
in ExpenmentI ) weretnrncatedto that
score.
Plausibilitv. The meanRTsand error ratesfor the comprehension-recall
and comprehension-oniy
groupsare shownin
Tablel: asrord. thegroupsdid not differsigniicantly;therefore,onlyanaiyses
for thecombiuedgroupsarereported.Analysesof the plausibrlirydecision
erroni, using a r test of differencesand (for lengfb) the Friedman rwo-way ANovA,
showedno significanteffecsof format,plausibrliryor sentence
lengrh.In theanalysisof decisiontime, all-words€nrences
were
responded
to 103ms fasterrhan rebussenrences,
FL,o(l, 50) =
4.29,p < .05. The decisionthat a senrence
waspiausiblewas
made178ms lasterthan rhe desrsionthat it wasinplausible.
F;,,( 1.49) = 4.59,p < .05;therewasno isteracrionwrth formal The lengthof a sentence
did not havea significanteffect
on decisiontimq rhemeanRTs(with error ratesin parentheses)
for sentences
of 8. I 0. I 2, and 14wordsrespertivei_v.
wereI ,299
ms (.09),1,382ms (.13),1,372ms (.12)and 1.328ms (.14),
and therewasagainno interacdonwrth rebusversusall-word
t1
I
A'
A
SD
623
494
.r4
.08
651
.i0
formal The fact that decision time did not increasesystenurucally with increasinglength of sentence(at leasrfor leugrhs l0l4) suggestsrhat subjectswereable ro processsenrencemeaDing
ou line, that is, whtle rhe words and picture were being presentedOmissions in recall. Recatl results are shown in Figure l.
ANOvASwere carried out on the arcsine-transtbrmed proportion of omined words per sentence.There was no significanr
difference between comprehension-recall and reca.il-only
groupsin the subjectsanalysis,Fr( I, 30) = 0.75, a.lthoughthere
was a significant difference (favoring the comprehension-recal.l
group) in the items anatysis.1cr(1,28) = 7.16,p <.025. Sentence format had no signifrcant effect on recajl: l3po of rhe
words were omined in all-word sentencesand t4qowere omitted in rebussentences.The rebus picture itseifwas incorreqlv
identifiedor omirted in oniy 77oof the senrences.
and rhe correspondingword was missedin 67oof the all-worcisenrences.
Nor
did piausibility significantly ali'ect recajl of the senrence:rhere
were I3Voomisions in plausiblesentencesand l.4Voin implausible sentences.
The lengrh of the sentence,howevet had a significant efecr
(o)Comprehensron-Recol
I
q)
=
E
^- io<
df |-.{
o-o
o-r
All wods. Plousrble
,1llwords.lmotoust(
REBUS,Plousrble
REBUS,lmplousrole
fh)
Porall
nal.,
25 iI
6
3
, "i
I
)-\ !
-l
I
-l
q,
a
tol
i
_t
-I
1
U
I
lo
t2
14
l-ngth of Senrence(Woros) Length of Senfence
(Wordsl
Figure l. Experiment l: The percentageof worcls omined in recall of
scntencesin (a) the comprehension-recallgroup and (b) the recall_oniv
group.
PICTURES TN SENTENCES
onrecall,F.n(3,3+1= 5.6t,0 <.01 (seeFigure1).ANewmanKeuls test showedthat the percentageof words omitted was lowest for 8-word sentences(67o),highest for l2-word sentences
(1970),and intermediate for l0-word and l4-word sentences
( l57o each). The low error rate for sentencesas short as 8 words
is not particularly surprising. The higb proportion oferrors on
the l2-word sentencesseemsto have been a sampling effecg
becausea different group of l2-word sentences(w Two pictures in a sentence,later) had 15% errors. Thus" the error rate
per word did not increasesystematically asthe number ofwords
in a sentenceincreasedfrom l0 to 14. There was a marginally
signifrcant three-way interaction of sentence length with group
and plausibility (seeFigure l), ,Fr(3, 90) = 2.29, p < .10; F2(3,
28) = 4.9t, p < .05. Plausibles€ntenceswere recalled more accurately than implausible sentencesby the comprehension-recall group, at Each sentence lenglh, whereas the recall-only
group showed no consistent effect of plausibility on recall. No
other interactions were significant.
Two pictures in a sentence.In eight extra l2-word sentences
(mixed with the main set of sentences),the effect of presenting
two pictures, one or the other picture, or no pictures in a given
sentencewas assessed(each ofthe eight sentencesappeared in
all four forms, counterbalanced across subjects). The question
was whether any problems encountered with a single picture
would be exaggeratd when there w€re two pictures. For example, ifa rebus picture were processedseparatelyfrom the rest
of the sentenceand then fitted in (as might happen if a picture's
name had to be retrieved), two rebus pictures might be eveu
more difrcult to manage.Subjecs took I , I 79 ms (with . l0 er.'
rors) to decidethe plausibility of all-word s€nrences,1,280 ms
(with .1 I erron) when there was one or the other picture, and
1,243ms (with .l0 erron) when there were two pictures. Thus,
as in the main results, sentenceswith any pigtures were responded to somewhat more slowly than all-word sentences,
t(23) = I .48, p < . I 0, one-tailed,aithough just as accurately.In
recail ofthe sentences,167oofthe words in all-word sentences
wereomitted, comparedwith l4Voin one-picture sentencesand
l47oin Uo-picture sentences:Clearly there w:uino impairment
in recall due to pictures. In sum, there was no hint of a further
increasein the diftculty of comprehendingand recalling a sentencewhen the number of picrures increasedfrom one to two.
Discussion
The presentaUon of sentencesseridly at a rate of 12 words
per secondsucceededin ta:dng the abiiity ofsubjects to understand and report the s€ntences,even when no picture was included. That is most clearly shown by the recall results (Figure
I ), in which the proportion oferrors would havebeennear zero
ifthe sentenceshad beenpresentedat a slowerrate. Plausibilityjudgment errors were also sufrciently high ( l27o overail) to assure that ceiling effects wouid not obscure possible diftculties
introduced by a rebus picture. At the sametime, most subjects
on most rials did evaluate plausibility correctly and did recall
at l€st the gist of the sentence.suggestingthat the outcome of
s€ntence processing iu the present asks was not drastically
di.fferentfrom normal.
Under these fairly difrcult reading conditions, a marked disruptiou in processingrebus sentencesshould have resulted ifa
285
picture had not provided the information needed to fit it into
the seutence.Instead, rebus sentenceswere understood and rec^lled as accurately as all-word sentences,although the plausi
bility judgment took 103ms longer.(As already mentioned, this
RT difference was not replicated in later experiments that used
different materials.) Given the 218-ms disparity between picture- and word-naming time in the pretes! the lexical representation of the rebus picture should have arrived belatedly and
probably out of order-When reading so rapidly, subjecu would
have little opportunity to recover from such a delay; one mrght
have expected substantial disruption of recall (as in Mitcheil,
1979) and a marked increase in mistaken plausibiiity judgments, Dot just an increase in RI that was half the magnirude
of the disparity in naming latency. Therefore, it is rgasonable
to conclude that information stored with or accessedexclusiveiy
from a lexicai entry is not essential for sentence processing. A
conceptual representation (readily available from the picilre)
could be integrated rather smoothly into the sentence.
In Experiment l, it was not only the lexical statusof a rebus
picture that made it different from the word it repiaced;surface
characteristicssuch as global shapeand size aiso made the picture distinctive. Experiment 2 investigated the possibilit_vthat
the longer RTs and slightly lower recail accuftlcy for rebus sentences observedin Experiment I could be due simply to rhe
startle effect of a shift in appearance.On the other hand. the
distinctiveness of the picture format might have helped the
viewerto pick out that important "word" in the sentence.leading to an underestimation of the difficulty of rebus pictures
(Theios & Freedman, 1984, have shown that large-sizedpictures havean advantageover smaller sized words). Experiment
2 permined us to test this hypothesisas well. In Experiment 2's
all-word sentences,the word correspondingto the rebus picture
was made visually surprising by changingit to uppercaseletten
and doubiing its size.Thus, both the rebus picture and the cnrical word iu all-word sentenceswere visuailv distinctive.
Experiment2
Method
Subjects.Sixteennew subjectsfrom the samepool asthosein E.rperiment I werepaid for their participation.
Materials. The scnteocc were identical to those of Experiment l,
exc@t that only two of the four sets of materials were used. Format
(rcbus picture vs. one large word) was counrerbalanced over individuai
ssntencesbut plausibiliW was not; a fixed half of the sentenceswere
plausible. In the all-word sentencei the words correspondingto rebus
pictures werc printed in block upp€rquc letters about twice the uridth
and height ofthosc usedfor the other words ofthe sentence"In vrervrng
the senteuce, thar word seemed to expand or pop outward. just as a
rebuspicture gavethe impressionofpopping ourward.
Procedure.The procedurewas like thar ofthe comprehension-reca.ll
group in Experiment I exceptthat 8 subjectssaw one ofthe rwo seu of
materials, 8 subjecs saw the other, and all subjectswere toid that senteocesmigbt include a largeword or picture.
Results
The main question of Experiment 2 was whether largewords
would eiiminate (or exaggerate)the reaction rime d.ifferencebetweenall-word and rebussentences:Thev did nelther.The over-
PICTURESIN SENTENCES
Method
Subjeas. The 16 subjectswere from the pool described previously.
None had panicipated in the earlier experiments.
Materials, design, and apparatus. The stimulus materials consisted
of48 sentencesvarying in length from 9 to 13 words (M = 10.6).The
final word named a picturable object. To produce the implausible versions ofthe sentences,the frnai words (pictures) were iuterchangd betw€en senteDces.
Thus, there were lour forms ofeach sentence:plausible or implausible, ending in a picnrre or a word Examplesof the sentences are given in the Appendix. Four versions of the materiais were
constructed,eachcontaining 12 sentencesofeacb ofthe four types, in
random order. There were 8 additional practice sentences.Each group
of4 subjectssawone versionofthe marerials.
The RSVP scntenc* were presented on a CRT using a rener microcomputer. The words were ceatered on the screen, iN were the rebus
picnrres. The pictures were line drawings similar 16 thosc used in the
earlier expcrimenrs, entered into the rener graphics memory using a
HiPad digirizer. Picnrres were beld in a buffer that, like the wordg allowed full prescnrationin a singlescan( 16.7 ms). The plausibiiity decislon was made by pressing one key for 1es and another for no, with the
right and left hands, respectively; RI was measured from the onsct of
the final word or picture.
Procedure. Each trial wasinitiated when the subject pressedthe space
bar. A row ofrhree asterisksappeared for 300 ms, followed by a 200-ms
blank interv"al aod the seDrence,presented at l0 words pcr second. The
words were in lowercaseletten, except that the final word corresponding
to the rebus pictr.rrewas in uppercaseleners.
Subjec6 were asked to repeat aloud the first four practice sentences,
after making the plausibility deeision, to make surc that they were able
to read most or all ofthe worG (one subject was replaced becauseof
marked diftculty in readingthe pragtice sentences).For the remaining
pracdce tria.ls and the rest of the experiment, subjects were encouraged
to make their responsesas rapidly as possible,od the basisoftheir frrst
impression of rhe plausibiliry of rhe scnrence.Subjecs completed the
experiment independently,aithough rhc experimenter rcmained in the
room.
ResultsandDiscussion
CorrectRIs longerthana subject's
meanplus2 SDswere
truncated to that number (4.47oof rebus sentences.4-7Voof allword senteuces).Mean RTs and error rates are shown in Table
3. Aualysesof the correct RR showedthat responsesto all-word
sentenceswere marginaily faster (by 22 ms) than responsesto
rebussentences,.Fr(
l, l5) = 4.54,p = .05, Fz(|,47) = 1.25,p >
.25. Plausiblesentenceswerejudged 70 ms fasterthan implausible ones,F;,(1, 6L) = 7.64,p < .01 There was no significant
interaction berwecnmodaiiry and plausibiliry, F,(1, 15) < 1.0;
F2(1,41) = 2.38.As Table 3 shows,however,the marginal word
advantagewas confined to the implausible sentences.Similar
anaiysesofthe errors showed no significant effects; all Fs were
lessthan 1.0.Inspectionof Table 3 showsthat the error rate was
low in all conditions. The results confirm the main finding of
Experiments I and 2: Rebus sentencesare not substantially
more diffcult to read and undentand than are all-word sentences.That is rrue evenwheu the critical picture appearsat the
end ofthe sentenceand hencethere is no extra time to retrieve
the lexicai entr.vin parallel with reading the sentence(as there
may have been in Experiments I and 2). The statisucailv margnal 22-ms word advantageis an order of magnitude smailer
than would be expectedifsubjects did haveto retrieve a lexical
287
representation for the picture before they could assessthe plausibility of the sentence. Thus, the results conflict with the view
that lexical representationsare essendalin sentenceprocessing.
Experiment4
A marked difference in naming latency between words and
pictures has been obtained wheu stimuli are presentedin isolation, as in the pretest for Experiment I (seeTable I ). Becauseit
is this difference that is crucial in the logic underlying the present experiments,it is important to show that the differencealso
holds for words and pictures presented in a sentence conrext.
Supposeit should turn out that picture-naming latency is close
to word-naming latency when both are in a sentencecotrtexq if
so, our claim that rebus pictures are integrated into the sentence without lexical retrieval would be uudermined. In Experiment 4, subjects named pictures and words presented as the last
item in a sentence,using the materials of Experiment 3. One
group ofsubjects saw the sentencesand named the last word or
picture (which was plausible or implausible in conrext). A second group named the samewords and pictures foilowing a neutral sentence:"The next item is the. . ." The rate of presentation was l0 words per second,as in Experiment 3.
Method
Subjeas. The 24 subjectswerefrom the pool describedpreviousiv^
Nonehadparticipatedin the earlierexperiments.
Sixteenwerein one
group,8 in theother.
Materiatsand design. The samesentences
as thoseusedin Experiment3 wercusedlor Group I (nf = l6). As in Experiment3, therewere
lour versions
ofthe expcriment.
counterbalancing
picturesversus
worG
andplausibleversusimplausiblesentence
context.A neutraiseDtence
"The
context.
next item is the." wasusedfor Group 2 (lf = g). For
thisgroupthereweretwo versrons
ofthe experiment.counterbaiancing
wordsandpictures.As before,the orderofthe wordsand pictureswas
random.The critical wordwascapitalized
hocedure. Exceptasspecified,the procedurewasfte sameas rhat
of Experiment3. Subjecawereinstructedto oamethe last word or
pictureas rapidlyas posible; latencywasmeasured,
by a voicekey,
from theonsetof thecriticalitem.Theexperimenter
recordedthesub.
ject'sresponsc.
In Group l, subjects
weretold that readingthesenreDce
would helpthem to respondmore rapidly; they wereajsotold rhat rhe
s€nteuccs
couldbeplausibleor implausible.In Group 2, subjectswere
toid whatthe neutrals€ntence
wouldbe.As in Experiment3, subjects
wereaslccdto repeataloud the first lervpracticesentences.
No subjec
hadunusualdiftculty in doingso,sononewasexcludedfromtheexoerimenL
ResultsandDiscussion
Correct Rfs longer than a subject's mean plus 2 SDs were
truncated to that number (in Group l,3Vo of sentenceswith
pictures and,2Voof all-word sentences;in Group 2" 2Voof pictures, 37oof words). The mean RTs and error rates are shown
in Table 3 (synonyms or semantically close names for rhe
pictures-about 9Voof the tnals-were accepted as correct).
Becauseerror rates were low, no funher analvsisof the errors
was carried out. In addition to naming errors. 47o of the responsesin Group I and 57oin Group 2 were omitted from the
288
POTTER, KROLL V{CHZEL CARPENTER. SHERMAN
Table3 .
MeanReactionTimes(in Milliseconds),StandardDeviations,andEnor Ror,es
inJudgingthePlausibilityof RebusandAll-Word
(Experiment3) and in Naming the Picturesand Wordsin ThoseSentences
Sentences
or l{ewral Sentences(Experiment4)
Rebus
Sentencetypc
Plausible
Implausible
RT
.sD
794
880
t94
zQ4
. Words
RT
Word advanage
RT
SD
Experiment3: Plausibilityjudgment
.06
788
t72
.05
842
202
.05
.04
6
38
.0r
.01
.01
184
-.01
1a
83
.01
)71
.01
Experimcnt 4: Naming
Croup I
Plausibie
Implausible
Ncutral
990
t,120
r.016
129
t67
rt2
.00
.04
805
807
.04
Group2
794
RT analysesbecausethe subject made an irrelevant sound before responding,or the voice key faiied to respond.
Anaiysesof variance on subject meansand item meanswere
carried out. For Group l, who named pictures and words in
piausibieand implausible senlencecontexts,the 248-ms advantageof words wassignificant,fl.,n(1,40) = 45.3 p <.00 l, as
was the 65-ms advantageof plausible over implausible sentences.F;,.( 1, 45) = /.r5, p < .0 l. The interacdonof theserwo
lactorswas aiso significant,F;,,(1,46) = 6.61,p < .05. The
interpretation of this interaction is simple: Whereas there was
a large plausibilitv effect flor pictures, there was none at all for
words. Even for piausible sentences.however.the t 84 ms faster
response to words than to pictures was highly significant
(p<.001).
In Group 2. with a neutral sentencecontext. words were
named222 ms fasterthanpictures..F.,n(l. I 7) = 37.9,p < .00l.
In an anaiysiscomparingGroup I's responsesto plausiblesentenceswith Group 2's responsesto neutrai sentences.there was
no significant overail difference (both .Fr and Fz were lessthan
1.0)and there w:Lsno interaction betweengroup and the modaliry of the stimulus in the subjectsana.lysis(.Fr < 1.0), although
F:(1. 17) = 4.71.p <.05.The main effectof modaliry was
highlvsignificast.F;,n( 1, 58) = 50.5,p < .001.In a comparison
of Group I's responses
to impiausible sentenceswrth Group
2's responsesto neural sentences.Group I's responseswere
somewhatsiower.overall,aithough the differencewassignificant
oniy in the itemsanaiysis,F ll, 22) = 1.83.p < .20, F.,.|.,47) =
10."1.p < .01. There was a suggestionof an inrcraction with
m o d a i i t - v. F, r ( 1 l.: ) = 2 . 4 3 ,p < . 1 4 , F 2 0 , 1 7 ) = 5 . 7 ,p < . 0 3 .
Inspection of Table 3 indicates thar words were virtuaily unaliected by an implausibie contexl whereaspictures were 104
ms slower when the conrext was implausible rather than neutral. Agatn, the maiu effect of modaiiqv was highly signincant.
F;,.( 1.57) = i6.-1.p < .001.
In comparing the overail latencieswith those of the naming
pretest tbr E.xpenment i (Table I ), it is evident that naming a
word or picture at the end of a sentence(even a neutral sentence)is slowerrhan naming wirh no context.The stimuli and
apparatusweredifferent in the two experiments.so the compar-
8l
.UJ
.UJ
(not
ison must be interpretedcauriousl-v.
but the result suggests
surprisingiy)that processingthe conrext sentencetakes some
capacity. (Note. however, that the size of rhe picture-word
difference was at lea$ as great unth a sentencecontext as wi&
no context whatever.)
The main resuit from both groups in Experiment 4 is tbar
pictures take markedly longer to name than words when presentedin sentences.jusr
as they do when presentedin isoiauon.
This finding conhrms the assumptionthat a le.ricalrepresenation for a picture is availablelater than that for a word even
in a sentencecontext. A secondresult is also imponant The
appropnateness
of the sentencecontext had no effect on worci
naming,but had a dramatic effecton picture naming. This suggeststhat the lexical enrrv is contacredindependenrlyoi sentencecontextin the caseof words ( Forsrer.198I ), but only sui>
sequentto the anaiysisof the whole sentence(inciuding rhe pictured concept) in the case of pictures. This result provides
strongsupport for the conceptualview ofsentenceprocessing.
In pilot work for Experiment 4. a group of 8 subjects was
instructed to name the hnal item and then report the plausibrlitv of the sentence.With this insrruction. responsesto words
were slowed by 206 ms and responsesto pictures by 39 ms.
reducing the picture-word difference to t 32 ms. and a substantiai piausibility etfect was obtained for words (a 47-ms effecr)as
well aspictures (a I I l -ms effect). This suggeststhat subjecu cal
name words either at the point of initial lexicai accessor cal
delaytheir responseto a later point. subsequentto senlenceprocessing.This ma account for inconsisrent resuits in the literarure conceming the influence of sentencecontext on naming
latency.
Just what is meant by retrievai of a lexicaj represenarion.
and how is retrieval related to overr naming? An assumprion
we havemade is that differencesin naming latency for pictured
objects and written words reflect differences in the time required to accessthe menai represenation of that word. Notice
thar becausethe overt responseis the samewhetherthe stimuius
is a picture or written word. motor planning and output can
be disregarded.Becauseno parailei difference berweenpictures
and words is found in tasks requiring undersrandins wirhout
288
POTTER, KROLI- Y{CHZEL CARPENTER. SHERMAN
Tabie3 .
MeanReactionTimes(in Milliseconds),StandardDeviations,and Enor Ratesin JudgingthePlausibility of RebusandAll-Word
Sentences(Experiment 3) and in Naming the Pictures and Words in Those Sentencesor Neutral Sentences(Experiment 4)
Rebus
Sentencetvoc
Plausible
Impiausrble
Plausible
Implausible
Neutral
RIr
.tD
794
880
194
204
990
I,120
1.0r6
rtq
t67
tt2
. Words
RT
.tD
Experiment3: Plausibilityjudgrnent
.06
788
t72
7i')
.05
842
Experiment4: Naming
Group I
.00
806
.04
807
.04
Group2
794
RT analysesbecausethe subject made an irreievant sound before responding,or the voice key faried to respond.
Anaiysesof variauce on subject meansand item meanswere
carried out. For Group l, who named pictures and words in
plausibieand implausibie sentencecontexts,the 248-ms advanuge of words was significant,F;,,(1, 40) = 45.3 p < .001, as
was lhe 65-ms advantageof plausible over implausibie sentences.F;,"( l, 45) = /.r5, p < .0 l. The interactionof thesetwo
fiactorswas a]sosignificanqF;,.(1,46) = 6.61,p < .05. The
interpretation of this interaction is simple: Whereas there was
a large plausibiiiry effect for pictures, there was none at all for
words. Even for plausibie sentences.however.the 184 ms faster
responseto words than to pictures was highiy significant
(p < .001).
In Group 2. wrth a neutral sentencecontext. words were
named222 ms fasrerthan pictures..F.,n(I . I 7) = 31.9,p < .00I .
In an analysiscomparingGroup I's responses
to plausiblesentenceswith Group I's responsesto neutral sentences.there was
no signifrcantoverail difference (both Fr and F: were lessthan
1.0)and there wasno interaction betweengroup and the modaiiw of the stimuius in the subjectsanaiysis(Fr < 1.0),although
higitly significant.f;,n( t, 58) = 50.5,p < .001.In a comparison
of Group I's responsesto impiausible sentenceswrth Group
2's responsesto neutral sentences.Group I's responseswere
somewhatsiower.overail,although the differencewassignificant
onlv in the itemsanalysis,f'L( l, 22) = 1.83.p < .20, Fz(1,47) =
10.a. p < .01. There was a suggestionof an interaction with
m o d a l i t - vF,r ( 1 . l 2 ) = 2 . 4 3 ,p < . 1 4 , f : ( 1 , 4 7 ) = 5 . 7 ,p < . 0 3 .
Inspection of Tabie 3 indicares that words were virmally unaliected by an impiausible context whereaspictures were 104
ms slower when the context was implausible rather than neutral. Agarn, the main effect of modaiiqv was highiy signincant.
F;,,( 1. 57) = i6..1.p < .001.
In comparing the overail latencieswith those of the naming
pretest tor E.rperiment I (Tabie I ), it is evident that naming a
word or picture at the end of a sentence(even a neural sentence) is slowerrhan naming with no context. The stimuli and
apparatusweredifferent in the two experiments.so the compar-
Word advantage
8l
RT
ns
.04
J6
.0r
184
6
.01
83
.01
.01
.01
-.01
.UJ
222
(nor
ison must be interpretedcauriousl-v,
but the result suggests
surpnsingiy)that processingthe context sentencetakes some
capacity. (Note. however, that the size of rhe picture-word
difference was at least as great with a sentencecontext as wtth
no context whatever.)
The main result from both groups in Experiment 4 is rhat
pictures take markedly longer to name than words when presentedin sentences.justas rhey do when presentedin isolauon.
This frndingconhrms rhe assumptionthat a lexicai represenntion for a picture is available later rhan that for a word even
rn a sentencecontext. A secondresult is aiso imponant: The
appropnateness
ofthe sentencecontext had no effect on worci
naming,but had a dramatic effecton picrure naming. This suggeststhat the lexicai entrv is contacted independenrlyoi sentenceconrextin rhe caseof words r Forsrer.198I ). but oniy sui>
sequentto rhe anaiyslsof the whole sentence(including the prctured concept) in the case of pictures. This result provrdes
strongsupport for the conceptuaiview ofsentenceprocessing.
In pilot work for Experiment 4. a group of 8 subjects was
instructedto name the hnal item and then report the plausibilitv of the sentence.With this instruction. responsesto woros
were slowed by 206 ms and responsesto pictures by 89 ms.
reducing the picture-word difrerenceto 132 ms. x1d 3 5s!5r:ntiai piausibility effect wasobtarned for words (a 47-ms effecr)as
well aspictures (a I I I -ms efect). This suggeststhat subjecr ca-u
name words either at the point of initiai lexrcal accessor caa
delaytheir responseto a later point. subsequentto sentenceprocessing.This may account tor inconsisrent resuits in the literarure concerningthe influence of sentencecontext on naming
latency.
Just what is meant by retrievai of a lexicaj represenrarion.
and how is retrievai related to overt naming? An assumpdon
we havemade is that differencesin naming latency lor pictured
objects and written words reflect differences in rhe time required to accessthe mentai representationof that word. Notice
that becausethe overt responseis the samewhetherthe stimulus
is a picture or written word. motor planning and output can
be disregarded.Becauseno parallei difference berweenpicrures
and words is found in tasks requiring undersnndinq wirhour
PICTURES IN SENTENCES
naming (suchasmatching to a categoryor deciding on the plausibility of a sentence),the large difference in naming latency
caanot be attributed to different speedsofperceptual recognition. A plausible explanation for the extra time required to
name pictures is that a picture's concept is retrieved first, and
a lexical entry for that concept is retrieved only subsequently
(e.g.,Potter & Faulcone4I 975; Snodgrass,I 984).
More specificaily, we have assumed the relative time to retrieve one part of a lexical entry-information
about
pronunciation-is a good measure of relative time to retrieve
other aspe'cu of the entry, including whatever semantic information is part of that entry. That is, the entry is assumed to
becomeavailable as a whole. No doubt this is an oversimplification. The components of a word's representation (its orthography, phouology, arriculiation, and syntax, leaving aside the present question about semantics) are separable under some circumstances, as work in neurolinguistics makes clear (e.g.,
Allport & Funnell, 198l). Nonetheless,it is a safe assumption
that in normal subjectsthere are close links among theseaspects
of a word's representation.Forster ( 198I ) argues,for example.
that naming latency is a pure measure of relative lexical retrieval time for written words. Neither in Forster's work nor in
this study is it claimed that the production of a phonologicai
code is required during reading however; that is a separate
question.Naming latency is simply usedas an index of relative
time to retrieve the whole lexical entry, including whatever semantic information is in the lexicon (rather than the conceptual
system).
Experiment5
Composition (combination) of word meanings is necessary
to understanda sentence.The lexical approach. we have suggested.assumesthat composition is basedon syntactic and semantic information provided in the lexicon. That assumption is
undermined by the evidencefrom Experiments l4 that rebus
pictures can enter into the composition of s€ntencemeaning
without contacting the corresponding lexical representation.
lnstead,semanticcomposition would appearto take placein an
amodal cooceptual system:words (like pictures) merely serve
aspointers to the relevantpart ofthe conceptualsystem.
A more focusedtest of the locus of semanticcomposition was
made in Experiment 5, in which pictured objects and equivaleut nouns were presentedwith and without a precedingadjective. An adjectiveand noun in a noun phraseconstitute the paradigm case of semantic composition. A concept such as o/d
chair is not simpiy the norion of oid plus the notion of chain but
someuotion more like chair that is old for a chain The puning
togetherof such complex ideasmight be guided by information
in the lexicon. if the lexical approach is right. In that case,a
rebus picture should not combine as readiiy with a preceding
adjectiveas wouid the correspondingnoun, even under conditions when pictures without adjectives are readily understood.
Method
Subjects.The 24 subjectswerefrom the samepool usedin previous
experiments;
nonehadpanicipated
in anyofthe previousexperimens.
.\[aterialsandapparatus.Themateria.ls
for theexoerimentconsisted
289
offorry-eight l2-word sentences(ll words, when the adjective was
omitted), eachofwhich included a concrete noun that was replacedby
a picture in the rebusvenion oflthe sentence.The noun or picture could
be precededby an adjective; the adjective was selectedso that the plausibility of the sentence was not appreciably affected by its omission. Furthermore, the adjective was neutml with respe'ctto ahepicturq The picturc was an appropriate illustration of the equivalent phrase whether
the adjective was included or deieted. Exampies are rented house and
ripe strawberry. Half the sentences(selected randomly) were made implausible by replacing a plausible hnal word with an implausible one,
(e.g, "A ripe strawberrydropped from the basketand roiled acrossrhe
sky"). Other examplesare given in the Appendix.
Eight piausible filler sentences(which formed a separate pilot experiment) w€rc intermixed with the 48 main sentences.The adjectives in
two of thesc sentencesin each version were choseu to be incompatible
with the rebus picture; examples are sliced lemon (with a picture of a
whole lemon) and, uprooted tree (vith an uprigbt tree). The resutts of
thiq pilot were generallyconsistentwith the main experiment and will
not be discussedfunher,
The RSW sentenceswere presentedou a CRT using the method describedin Experiment 3. The plausibility decisionwasmade by pressing
one key for yes (with the right hand) and anorher for no (with rhe left
hand). Recallwasspoken.
Design and procedure. Four venions of the materials were prepared
in which a given sentenceappearedwith or without the critical a jective, and with a rebuspicture or ail in words. Halfthe 48 sentenceswere
implausible; this lactor wiui not varied for a given sentence.In each
vcrsion,there wereequal numbers of sentenceswith and without adjectives.with and without pictures. and plausible versusimplausible. (The
8 filler sentenceswere ail plausible. however.so overall there were 32
plausible s€ntencesand 24 implausible sentencesin each version.)
There were 7 additional practicesenrences.
Each trial was initiated when the subject pressedthe space bar. A
ror of three asterisksappearedfor 300 ms. fotlowed bv a 200-ms blank
interval and the sentence.presentedat l0 words per second.Except for
the first lener of the first word. the words were in lowercaseletten. Subjects were inskucted to decideon the plausibilirvof the sentenceand
then recall it aloud. The experimenterrecordedanv errors in recajl.
Results and Discussion
To preview the main results, rebus sentenceswithout adjectives were as rapidly and accurately comprehendedand about
as accurateiyrecalled as the correspondingail-word sentences.
Rebus sentenceswith adjectives,although as accurateiy comprehended as the all-word controis. were less accurateiv recalled, and there was also somesuggestionthat rhose sentences
were acceptedas plausible more slowly than sentencesin the
other conditions. As will be seen.howevet this rebus-adjecdve
impairment had an unanticipated panern: The effect was restricted to familiar noun phrases.This pattern. we wiil argue.
is not what would be expectedif lexical enrries are neededfor
noun phrasecomposition.
Plausibility judgments. The results of the piausibilitv judgment are shown in Table 4. The overall error rate was . I l; no
analysis of errors was carried out becauseinspection showed
that the error rate did not vary substanrially with anv oi the
variables. In particulan, there was no difference in error rares
between rebus and all-word sentencesor berween sentences
with the adjectiveand those without. nor was rhere an inreraction; all four meanswere.I l.
Anaiyseswere carried out on correct RIs atier replacing long
290
POTTER. KROLL. V{CHZEL. CARPENTER.SHERMAN
Tabie4
Experiment5: ReactionTimesftn.Villiseconds),StandardDeviations,andError Ratesin Judging
Wth and Withoutan.ldiective
thePlawibilitv of Sentences
Implausible
Plausible
Words
Rebus
Noun phrase
Adjecuve
No adjectle
RT
1,146
I,096
cn
154
).J t
RlT
.09
.08
I t7l
L .L ' J
KI
SD
| )11
250
215
.tD
325
159
RTswith a given subject's mean plus 2 SDs(4.9Voof the trials).
Oniy sentenceplausibility had a significant effect"with plausible sentencesciassified 105 ms faster than implausible sent e n c e sF. r ( l , 2 0 ) = 7 . 5 , p < . 0 2 , F 2 ( 1 , 4 6=) 8 . 1 4 ,p < . 0 1 .A l l
other Fs. for both main effectsand inreractions, were lessthan
l. I0. Nonetheless.
inspectionof the meansshowsthat. for plauthe presenceofan adjecriveincreasedthe RT to
sibiesentences.
rebussentences
by 50 ms. but did not affectall-word sentences.
This pattern. which is what wouid be expectedif the lexical approach is correcl was not presentin impiausible sentences,but
that couid mean that the subjects were not obliged to process
the rebus adjectivein order to confrrm the implausibility of the
sentence.Thus. even though theseeffectswere not sutisticaily
significant, they were suliciently like those predicred from the
lexical approach to make one cautious about acceptingthe null
hypothesis.(However.seethe discussionbeiow for funher illumination of this resuit.)
Rccall. Three recail measureswere tabulated: (a) recall of
the noun orpicture. (b) recail ofthe adjective.and (c) recall of
rhe orher l0 words of the sentence.Although reca.llaccuracy
was expectedto be sensitiveto processingdifficultv. it rvasnot
obvious in which of the three measuresdiftculties would be
manrfest.As it turned out. only measure(c) (recail of the other
l0 rvords) showed significant effects of the experimentai variables.On measure(a). thecntical noun wasrecailedincorrectly
in .l I of the sentenceswith an adjectiveand.l0 without: the
correspondingerror rates for the rebus picture were . I 2 and .08
(ns). On measure(b). grvencorrect recall of the critical plcture
or noun. the adjecrrvewas omitted in .3 I of the rebus sentences
and .-i I of the ail-word sentences(not significant. by a binomiai
test).
Concerning recall measure (c), the proportions of recall errors among the remaining l0 words in the sentenceare shown
in Table 5. Recdl was marBinaily more accurate for sentences
without adjecdvesthan for those with adjectives(.16 vs. . i9 of
the wordswereomined. respectiveiv),
F'( I, 23) = r.53. p < .13.
=
I'r( l. 46) 9.92.p < .0 l. Recall wasalso marginally more accurate for all-word than lor rebus sentences,(.16 vs..l8 omiss i o n s )F
, 1 ( 1 ,2 3 ) = 3 . 6 7 ,p < . 0 ' 1 ,F z ( i , 4 6 ) = 5 . 6 1 .p < . 0 3 .
Plausible sentenceswere be[er remembered than implausible
(.14 vs. .10 omissions)in the subjectsanaiysrs.Fr(1.
sentences
20) = 29.05.p < .001.but not in the items analysis.F:( l. 46) =
2.61. p > .10 (note that plausibiiity was a between-sentences
vanable).
The main eliecls rverequaiified by second-orderinteractions
between rebus tormat and each of the other variables. Rebus/
Worcls
Rebus
. lI
.tD
RI
300
, I J
.14
word format and plausibiliry interacted, Fr( l, 23) = 5.49, p <
.03, F2(1,46) = 5.55,p < .03.A Newman-Keulstest sho*'ed
that impiausible rebus sentenceswere less accurately recalled
(.22 omissions)than plausiblerebussentences(. l7 omissions),
which were lessaccurateiy recalled than either piausible or implausibleali-word sentences
(. I 4 omissions).![ore to the poinl
there was an interaction between format and the presenceor
= ) 6 . 1 3 .p < . 0 2 , F : ( 1 . - t 6 ) =
a b s e n c e oaf n a d j e c t i v e . . F r ( 1 . 2 3
p
<
5.a0,
.03. A Newman-Keuls test showedthat rebus sentenceswith adjectives were recailed less accurately (.21 omrssions)than other typesof sentences(.16 omissions),which drd
not differ. The triple interaction of format, piausibility, and adjective condition was not significant; Fr and F1 were both less
than l.
Le.rtcal composition versuslexical lookup oJ'stock phrases.
The observedincreasein the difficuity of recallinga rebussentencewhen it includesa picture precededby an adjectives€ens
to support the claim that composition of word meaningsdependson semanticinlbrmatron in the lexicon.inlbrmatron thar
would be lessreadily avaiiabletor a picture. There is. howerer.
anotherpossrbleexplanatronoi the result:.\t leasrsomeoi'|ie
adjective-noun phraseslsuch as seedlessgrapes) couid hare
been tamriiar to subjectsand theretbresrmply recognizedas
whole phrases.The integriry of the phrasewould be destro"eci
by replacingthe noun with a picture. so that lexica.llookup oi
the phrase as a whole couid not occur. It has been noted b_"many authors(e.g..Lyons. t977) that. wrth lrequent use. certaln combinations of words becomesuficienrly familiar thar
they become much like a' true compound expression.Tbe
meaning of such tamiiiar. partiaily lrozen phrases may not be
Table,i
Expertment 5: Proportions o,l'WordsOmiued and Standarci
Devtattonsin Recall oJ'Rebusand.Tll-Word
SentencesWith and Wthout an.ldiective
Plausible
),{ounphrase
.tD
AdJectlve
No adjecrive
091
080
Implausible
JT)
cn
SD
.081 .:6
. 0 8 8 .1 9
.Vcrre.
Errors in recail ofthe l0 words other than the adjective(ifenr.r
and the cntrcai noun or picturg. p = proponion of wordsomrtted.
PICTURES IN SENTENCES
computed from the meanings of the individual words, but instead may be retrieved as a whole (e.g., Poner & Faulconeg
1979;Swinney & Cutleq 1979). That is, rhe phrase may act as
a single lexical entry seedlessgrapes, like outright compounds
suchashot dog.
Although the phrase seedlessgrapes (uniike hot dog) can be
understood by the normal compositional process, the compound route might be faster because it would require retrieval
of one lexical entry, not two" and semantic composition would
be bypassedentirely. Substituting a picture for the noun would
prevent use of the compound route (uniessthe picture's name
was retrieved frrst): Only the compositioual route would be
available. Therefore, for a stock phrase that migbt be recognized asa single lexical unit, having both the adjective and noun
as words should make for easier processing than having the adjective plus a picture.
Note the diference between the stock-phrase hypothesis and
the lexical venirxi conceptual hypotheses: The stock-phrase hypothesisconcemswhich strings of letters count as a single iexi.
cal item or word (Hot dog does; what about seedlessgrapes2),
and this question is separate from the issue of where word
meanrngsare represented. Whether seedlessgrapes has a single
lexicai entry one entry for eachof the two words, or (more plausibly) all three entries, the meaning of each of these entries
could be representedeitherin the lexicon itseiforin the concep.
tual system. The problem for the present research strategy,
however,is that stock phraseswouid grvean advantagefor words
over pictures that might be mistaken for a lexical advantagein
semantic composition, even though the point about stock
phrasesis that they do not require composition becausethey
alreadyexist as singlelexical entities. Fortunately,there is a way
to determine post hoc whether the (small) word advantageobserved in Experiment 6 is attributable to superior semanric
composition(the lexical hypothesis)or to stock phrases.Ifthe
stock-phrasehypothesisis correct. then only the more familiar
phrasesshould showa word (vs. picture) advantage.If, however,
the observedword advantagemeansthat semantic composition
is betterfor two words than for a word plus a picture, that result
should be at leastasevident for unfamiliar phrasesas for familiar phrases.
A post hoc test of the stock-phrase hypothesis was carried
out. usingratingsof phrasefamiliarity obtained from eight new
subjects.Nineteenphrasesout ofthe 48 were rated as definitely
flamiiiar (e.g., seedlessgrapes and copper kettle). A breakdown
of the resultsinro those l9 sentencesand the remaining 29 sentences supported the stock-phrase hypothesis. The familiar
phrasesshoweda .08 word advantagein recall (measure [c]),
whereasthe unfamiliar phrasesshowedonly a .02 word advantage.(The RT resultsshowedthe samegeneralpanern.)
Conclusions. A determined effon was made to find some
measureof performance in Experiment 5 that would show an
advantagefor all-word sentencesover rebus sentences.The only
significantword advantage.which appearedin just oue measure
(recall of the other words of a sentence),seemsto have been
due to a different factor entireiy, namely, the compound-like
processingof familiar adjecrive-noun phrases.For the lessfamiliarphrases, in which composition of meaning would be necessarythere wasno advantagefor all-word sentencesoverrebus
sentences.In the sentenceswrthout adiectives. there was no
291
difference between rebus and all-word sentences in respoise
times ( I ,167 and I , I 76 ms, respectively),error rates in judging
plausibility (.1 I I and .108, respectively),or recall errors (.844
and .845, respectively).Overall, then, no support was obtaioed
for the lexical approach.
General Discussion
The general question with which we began was whether aspectsof a word's meaning are included in its lexical representation, orwhether all semanticinformation is contained in a nonlinguistic conceptual system. These two possibilities give rwo
very different theoretical pictures of the relation between language and thougbt. The lexical approach has assumed thar semantic information in the lexicon is used to arrive at a literal
meaning for the sentence; 16i5 mganing is then passed to the
conceptual system for further nonlinguistic interpretation. in
contrast, the conceptual approach placesthe processofestablishing a sentence'smeaning in the general-purposeconceptuaj
system.
Becausea pictured object is conceptually but not lexicaily
equivalentto the correspondingnoun, the ability to understand
a rebus sentence(in which a picture repiacesa noun) wou.ld
support the hypothesisthat a noun acts as a conceptual element. Diftculty with undentanding a rebus sentencewou.ld
support the hypothesisthat a noun taps specifically lexical information during the composition of sentencemeaning. In the
present experiments,sentenceprocessingwas pushed clos€ to
is temporal limis by using RSVP at rates of l0 or 12 words
per second.in order to revealany differential effectsofincluding
a picture.
The main result was that rebus s€ntenceswere only marginally more difficult to understandand remember than equivajent
all-word sentences.With the sentencesused in Experimenc I
and 2, this difference was most evident in the time to make a
judgmentaboutsentencepiausibility,which rook about I04 ms
longer on rebus sentences.With two new sets of materiajs in
Experiments 3 and 5, there was no reliable rebus disadvantage
except in one circumstanceto be discussedshortly. Thus, overall, rebus sentencesdid not produce a consistentdelicit in speed
or accuracyof comprehensionor in accuracy of immediate recall. It made no differencewhether the picture appearedin rhe
middle of the sentence(Experiment 5) or at the end of the sentence (Experiment 3) and nor did it matter whether there was
one picture or two (Experiment l). Moreover,the rebus format
did not iuteract sigmficantly with other variabiesin theseexperiments, suchas plausibiiity and sentencelength"The absenceof
interactionssuggeststhat the rebus picture wasrepresentediu a
sentence-compatible
form at an eariy stageof processing,betbre
theseother variablescame into play.
Experiment 5 tested the hypothesis that a rebus picture
would havespecialdifficulty combining with a preced^ing
adjective. A small word advantagewas obtained in one special case:
when the phrasewasrated as familiar (e.g-,alarm c/ock). When
such phraseswere expressedin words they could evidently be
recognizedas a single lexical unit and therefore no semanuc
composition (whether lexical or conceptual) was required.
When the noun wasa picture, however,the lexical unit was bro_
ken up and semantic composition was necessary.When the
292
POTTER KROLL, YACHZEL CARPENTER SHERMAN
phrases were unfamiliac and both all-word phrases and wordpius-picture phrasesrequired semantic composition, the word
advantagedisappeared.This indicates that semandc composition (as distinct from lookup) was no harder for phraseswrth
pictures than for all-word phrases.This result supports the conceptual approach.
titne avaiiable for posible compensarory processingof the rebus picture. An experiment in which rhe sentencesof Experiment I were presentedin a conventional simultaneous format
gave much the same resuits, however (Poner & Ifuoll, 198+).'
This reinforces the conciusion of Potter ( 1984)that RSVP reading although speeded,draws on the same processing mecnausms as conventionai readins.
RSVP and On-Line Processing
The logc of the presentexperimentswrs to presentsentences
so rapidly that a deiay in encoding the rebus picture inro the
needed form (such as by silently naming it) would be highiy
disruptive. For the experiments in which the picture appeared
in the middle of the sentence(Experimens l, 2, and 5) the argument depends on the assumption that the sentenceswere processd on line. that is, word by word during presentation. If,
instead. sentence-levelcomposition began only after presentation of the whoie sentence,the name of the rebus picture might
have been retrieved by the time it was needed in processing.
This problem did not arise in E.rperiment 3 becausethe crirical
plcture or word wasat the end ofthe sentence,and yet there was
only a margrnal word advantagein that experimenr. Still, it is
worth reviewing briefly the evidence that procesing of an
RSVP sentencedoesindeed take place on line.
Four kinds ofevidence support on-line processing
l. If readerssimply stored the words as a list dunng presentatron and processedthe sentenceafterward" decision errors or
postsentencetlme to make the plausibility decision or both
would be expectedto increase with the length of the sentence.
But no such systematicincreaseswere observed(Experiments
I and 2).
2. Unreiated words are difficult to retain when presentedat
l0 or 12 words per second.even when the list is as shon as j
rvords(Pouer. l98l), whereasthe 8- to t4-word sentences
used
rn the presente.\penmentswere recailed tairiy accuratei_v.
3. Although the order of unreiated items is known to be
poorly retatned when they are presentd at rates of six or more
itemsper second(e.g.,Scarborough& Sternberg,1967:Speriing
& Reeves.1980).order errors in recall were low in the present
expenments(under2?o\.Torhe extent that readen incorporare
the words of a sentenceinto an interpreted structure as the
words arrive. order will be preserved.Consuaints on rhe possible word order of an unordered set of words might also contribute to the accurac-vof recall. but subjects are not very good
at reconstructing rhe order of scrambled RSVP sentences.For
example, in an experiment using the materials of E.rperiment
I (Potter & Kroll. 1984),26?oof the words recailed were misordered.compared with lgo in a comparison group wrth normaily
ordered RSVP sentences.
4. The pafierD of erron in immediate recall also supports
on-line processing.Typically, the words and phrasesreievantto
the marn topic of the sentencewere the ones omitted in recall.
That result can be explained in severalwa s, but ail the explanatlons .rssumethat rhe subject undentood at leasrthe grst of the
sentenceduring presentation(e.g., Fraueufelder,Dommergues.
Mehier, & Segui. 1979).A more detailed discussionof this and
other evidence lor on-line processing is provided in potter
( 1984:seeaisoMasson.in press).
RSVP was used in the presente.rperimenu to control the
When a Name Is Reauired: Rebus Puns and
German Gender
In Experiment 4 subjects named words and pictures that ap
peared in appropriate, neutral, or inappropriate sentencecontexts. latensy to name pictures was more than 200 ms longer
than to uame words, confrrming eariier results for pictures a.ud
words in isolation, and showing that a lexical entry for a picnrre
(even in a sentence)is not available as soon as that for a wrinen
word. Using a merhod rhat did not require overr naming, PocEr
(1981; see Footnote l) had subjeca judge the piausibiiitv oi
RSVP sentences
in which the rebuspicrure's name wasa homonym such as lock. In haif of the rebus senrencesthe picture
iilustrated the wrong meaning of the word, as in the following
in which a line drawrng of a padlock replaced the word /ocr.
"The girl
curled a lock of her hair nervously around her finger"
If readers routinely understand rebus sentencesby coveniv
naming the picture (perhaps at an absract morphophonemrc
level, Taft. 1984),such a picture pun might present no speqaj
difrcuit-v. One group of subjeca was instructed to decodesuch
picture puns and accept the resuiting sentenceas plausible
when the correspondingword would havebeen plausible.Thev
were slower and made more errors than another group of sui>
jectsinstructedto respondin terms of the pictured object irseif
(and henceto reject rhe picture puns).Thus. forcrng the usecf
r purely lexicai represenrarionof a rebus prclure cre3rec
difficulties,whereasforcing rhe useof a purely conceptualre*
resentationdid not.
In a secondexperiment(Potter & Carpenter.1984.seeFoornote l) a gven subject saw only two sentenceswrrh picture
puns, intermixed with a larger number of other rebus and allword sentences.Without any advancewarnrng that such picture
puns might occur. subjecrsspontaneousiyand rapidly rejecrxi
the pun 7 I 9oof the time. On rhe other 29voof the triais the pun
was accepted,but responseswere signifrcantlv siower than ror
other rebus sentences.These experiments provide evidence
agarnsta strongvenion ofthe lexicaiapproachin which a rebus
picture is replaced dunng senrenceprocessingby a single le.ucai representation.one rhat is ambiguous in rhe caseof homonymssuchas/ock (SeeBaron, 1973.for experimens usingan
analogousdesign to reject phonological represenudons as the
soie mediating representadonsused in reading.)
On the question of whether genderagreement requires a r:tnevai ofa lexical entry Schonie.Schon.and Friedhoff( lggl)
showed German subjects pictures or written words accompanied by a mascuiine. feminine. or neurer article (der die. cr
das). The task was to decide as rapidly as possible whether cr
' Details
ofPotter and Kroll ( I 984), Poner and Carpenter ( I 984). eno
Poner( 198I ) areavaiiableriom the hnr author.
PICTURESTN SENTENCES
not the article wascorrect(asnoted earlier,a noun's gendcrin
Germanis frequentlyunrelatedto the masculine,feminine, or
null sexofthe referent).For correct/es responscs,
the meanRT
was 360 ms longerfor pictures than for words. Once agai.',
when specificallylexical information was requird, pictures
took substantiallylongerthan words.
Pictured VersusNamed Concepts
Picturessuccessfully
replacedconcretenouns in the present
experimens.Could piaures replacewords other than nouns,
suchasverbsor adjectives?
We considerthat unlikely, becausc
anypicture of an actionis alsoa picture of one or moreobjects
(acton) carrying out the action, and almost any picture of a
propertyalsodepictsan object Thus, picturesare ill suitedto
depict verbsand adjectivesthat are separatefrom nouns.The
point of the presentexperiments,however,wasnot to shorvthat
picturescan replacewords in general(which they obviously
€nnot), nor to supportan imagery-bas€d
theory of meaning
but to makeuseof the alreadyestablishedequivalenceof some
picturedobjectsand their (basiclevel)namesto addressa specifrcissue,the representationofword meaning Wehaveshown
that there is one categoryof words (concretenouns) whose
meaningentersiDto s€ntenceprocessingat a concepruallevel
rather than a purely lexical level. That makesit unlikely that
the meaningsof other categoriesof content words enter at a
diferent level(viz.,lexical),for compositionof meaningcould
not takeplaceunlessall semanticinformation wererepresentd
at thesameprocessing
level.
On Modularity
Do the pres€ntresultsconflict with the hypothesisthat languageperceptionis modular(J. A. Fodor,1983)?It depends
on
whatthe modulesare takento be. Fodorbeiievesthat the languagemodule(which is itself a looselyinterconnected
set of
processing
unis) haslimitedinterpretivefunctions.All thelanguageprocessordoesis "delivegfor eachinput utterance,a rep
resentationwhichspecifiesits lexicalconstituenrs"(i.e.,the lexicai rypethat eachtokenword belongsto; p. 9l ) and probably
a syntacticanalysisof the sentenceat the levei of logical form.
Fodoracknowledges
that eventhis levelof output may require
considerable
computation(see,for slemplg, 1983,Note28, p.
135),and he is thereforenoncommittalabout just whereto
draw the line betweenthe languagemodule and nonmodular
cognitiveprocess€s.
It would seemclear,however,that an automaucsyntacticanalysisthat is entirely internal to the language
modulecouidnot bc carriedout on a s€ntence
in whicha picture substitutesfor a noun"without first identi&ing an appropriatelexicalqvpefor the picture-and wehavearguedthat that
doesnot happen.
Thepresentstudyhassaidnothing directly aboutsyntax,except to suggestthat sEntences
must havebeen paned successfuily or they would not havebeen undestood well enoughto
evaluatetheir plausibilityandto recallthem whenpresentedat
l0 or 12 words per second.Becauserebus pictures could be
processed
successfully
in suchsentences,
the syntacticprocessoris unlikelyto be fully modulanThe nouniikecharacterof a
picturedobjectmustbeunderstood
by theparser.
293
Conclusion
The purposeofthe presentresearchwasto evaluatetwo ap"
proachesto the representationof word meaning.Are wordsin
s€ntences
understoodand their meaningscombinedby virtue
of semanticinformation representedin the lexicon?Oq doesa
word'slexicalrepresentationsimply point to a general-purpose
conceptualsystemin which the meaningsofwordsareretrieved
and combined?The frndingthat a picnued objectcan successfully replacea noun in a rapidly pres€rttd sentencesuppofts
the secondoftheseapproaches.
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"advantage"
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Appendix
In thescexamplesof the marenalsin thc experimcna. thc capitalized
word becamea picture io the rebus ver:ion. For scntenceswith an implausible venion. the implausible iast word is shown in parentheses.
ExperimentsI and 2
The fox chascdthe CHICKEN around the yard. (kjtchen)
The OWL sat in the tree looking arouod for prey. (women)
When he left he lockcd the DOOR and walked up thc road (wail)
In the story of Snow White the rd APPLE that she ate was poisonous.
(nurntious)
Double-picturc scntences:
Plausiblq I left by COAT lying on thc BENCH and it got wrinkied.
Implausible: The refrigerator and COUCH were carrid dowu the
STAIRS by the baby.
Experiments3 and 4
Paui came to work soaking rct bccausc he lorgot his UMBRELi.-d.
(ANCHOR)
The old radio workcd afrcr she reolaccd the PLUG. (SHIRT)
Tom walked up to the donkey and heid out a CARROT. (TENT)
Sherrimmed oif the stem oithe rosewrrh the SCISSORS.(C.\R)
Expenment5
Plausiblcsentences(the adjective is shown in parenrheses):
Thc (alarm) CLOCK rang loudly so he hit it with his hand.
The spaniel puppy proudlv brought rhe ( brown ) SHOE up to the owner.
She uas able to identify the (poisonous) MUSHROOM by is musw
odor.
lmplausible scntences:
The man grabbcdthe woman's (leather) PURSE and ran inro rhe waves
For dcsscrt Ann served scverai cheescsand (scedless)GRAPES on a
glove.
The (borrowcd) TROWEL lay unused on a neglectedshelf in rhe refriger:rrcr.
ReceivedNovember I 8, I 985
RevisionreceivedMarch 10, 1986 r