Discourse Markers Activate Their, Like, Cohort Competitors

Speech in everyday conversations is riddled with discourse markers (DMs), such as well, you know, and like. However, many lab-based studies of speech comprehension, DMs are typically absent from the carefully articulated highly controlled stimuli. As such, little known about how these influence online word recognition. The present study specifically investigated processing DM like it influences activation words mental lexicon. We targeted cohort competitor (CC) effect Visual World Paradigm: Upon hearing spoken instructions to “pick up beaker,” human listeners also fixate—next target object—referents that overlap phonologically (cohort competitors beetle; CCs). several have argued CC effects constrained by syntactic, semantic, pragmatic, constraints. Therefore, whether recognition activating its (e.g., lightbulb). In an eye-tracking experiment using Paradigm, we demonstrate when participants heard “Now press button for the, … unicycle,” they showed anticipatory looks referent (lightbulb)well before target. This was sustained a relatively long period time, even despite disambiguating information (i.e., /k/ like). Analysis reaction times were significantly faster select targets (lightbulb) preceded These findings suggest seemingly trivial DMs, like, activate their CCs, impacting Thus, advocate more holistic perspective on language comprehension naturalistic communication, including DMs.