Only the shadower knows: comment on Hamburger and Slowiaczek (1996).

Abstract

The phonological priming effect may reflect basic processes in spoken word perception and has thus been a central topic of recent research. In this journal, Hamburger and Slowiaczek (1996) reported phonological priming data collected in a shadowing task. They replicated a prior study (Slowiaczek & Hamburger, 1992), but added new procedures to minimize bias. After observing inhibitory priming in a "low-expectancy" condition, they concluded that facilitatory priming reflects perceptual/response bias, but that inhibitory priming reflects automatic processes of lexical access. This commentary critiques Hamburger and Slowiaczek's method and presents new data that demonstrate persistent biases in primed shadowing. I suggest that such biases reflect natural, context-sensitive listening strategies.