First, we investigated whether semantic interference in the picture-word task generalizes from close neighbours to more distant category members. Second, we investigated the operationalisation of semantic distance. The presented work manipulated closely versus distantly related distractor words, and examined to which degree various operationalisations of distance determine semantic interference...

We report two experiments attempting to identify the role of semantic relatedness in picture-word interference studies. Previously published data sets have rendered results which directly contradict each other, with one study suggesting that the stronger the relation between picture and distractor, the more semantic interference is obtained, and another study suggesting the opposite pattern. We...

Global software developments intensify parallel changes. Although parallel changes can improve performance, their interferences contribute to faults. Current Software Configuration Management (SCM) systems can detect the interference between changes at textual level. However, our empirical study shows that, compared with textual interference, semantic approach is more effective and efficient in...

Global software developments intensify parallel changes. Although parallel changes can improve performance, their interferences contribute to faults. Current Software Configuration Management (SCM) systems can detect the interference between changes at textual level. However, our empirical study shows that, compared with textual interference, semantic approach is more effective and efficient in...

Picture-word interference studies typically show that semantically related distractor words embedded within a picture slow picture-naming responses, relative to unrelated ones. This semantic interference effect is commonly interpreted as arising from the competition of lexical-semantic (e.g., Schriefers, Meyer, & Levelt, 1990) or lexical-phonological (e.g., Starreveld & La Heij, 1996) codes. Th...

Previous dual-task studies examining the locus of semantic interference of distractor words in picture naming have obtained diverging results. In these studies, participants manually responded to tones and named pictures while ignoring distractor words (picture-word interference, PWI) with varying stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) between tone and PWI stimulus. Whereas some studies observed no se...

Incremental learning explanations state that semantic interference is driven by activation levels of competitors. To explore nonsemantic contributions to interference, we examined the combined and separate effects of facilitatory phonological form preparation and semantic relatedness in a blocked cyclic picture naming procedure. Phonological similarity was facilitatory when tested separately, b...