PSYC 3580 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Cumulative Frequency Analysis, Dependent And Independent Variables
29 Mar 2016
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Document Summary
The lexicon is a theoretical construct which contains information about words. Not simply alphabetical, as spelling isn"t always important. Meaning and relationships to other words might be more important. Related words are closer together than unrelated words. Lexicon organization is assessed by looking at the speed of processing for words. Factors that impact lexicons include frequency with which the words are encountered, length of words, and age of acquisition. Age of acquisition: estimate of how old people were when they learned particular words. Early learned words tend to be more simple than words learned later. To eliminate confounding factors, early age of acquisition and late age of acquisition words are equated on frequency, length, familiarity, concreteness, and imageability. Even when all of these factors are equal, people process early age of acquisition words faster than late age of acquisition words.
