The effect of visual priming on the lexical retrieval on implicit memory tasks for advanced foreign language learners

Résumé 0

This study investigated the possible effects of visual priming on a foreign language vocabulary retrieval on three implicit memory task types (i.e., word stem completion (WSC), word fragment completion (WFC) and anagram solution tasks). Gender effect was also focused for lexical retrieval under the priming effect. A total of 45 male and 45 female Iranian advanced EFL learners were recruited and assigned to each of the three experimental groups of the study which contained an equal number of males and females learners. WSC, WFC and anagram solution tasks held 30 lexical items which were developed out of 5000 most frequent words in English. 15 primed and 15 unprimed lexical items were randomly accommodated in each task. After the visual priming phase and distracting participants’ attention via an unrelated task, the participants were asked to do the implicit memory tasks according to their experimental groups. The results showed that participants gained higher scores on the visually primed lexical items on all implicit tasks (the maximum improvement for anagram solution task and the minimum for WFC). Also, no statistically significant difference was observed between males and females regarding their performance on implicit memory tasks under the visual priming effect.