The irrelevant sound effect under articulatory suppression: is it a suffix effect?

An experiment is reported that investigates the relation between the suffix effect and the effect of irrelevant sound on the serial recall of short sequences of spoken material. The main issue was whether there is an effect of irrelevant sound under articulatory suppression in the presence of a spoken suffix. As in Hanley and Bakopoulou (2003), the irrelevant sound comprised speech that was presented during the retention interval. When a spoken suffix appeared at the end of the list, a significant effect of irrelevant sound remained when participants were able to rehearse list items. However, it disappeared under articulatory suppression. The effects of irrelevant sound remained significant under suppression when the suffix was an auditory tone but was confined to the final position of the serial position curve. These results parallel those reported by Jones, Macken, and Nicholls (2004) and Jones, Hughes, and Macken (2006) when they examined the effect of articulatory suppression on the phonological similarity effect. The results are consistent with Jones et al.'s (2006, 2004) view that an acoustic-perceptual representation of the terminal list items is the source of the effects of irrelevant sound and phonological similarity when they occur in the presence of articulatory suppression.

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