Distractor frequency effects in picture–word interference tasks with vocal and manual responses

A number of studies have recently reported that in picture–word interference (PWI) tasks, distractors with a low frequency of occurrence interfere more with picture naming than distractors with high-frequency. This finding is not straightforward to accommodate within traditional accounts of word production in which lexical access is typically conceptualised as competitive. Instead, the distractor frequency effect has been taken to support a view according to which lexical access is not competitive, and PWI effects arise at a postlexical preparation stage. Two experiments are reported which contrasted picture naming with a manual task performed on the picture name (Experiment 1: syllable judgment; Experiment 2: phoneme monitoring). In both studies, an equivalent effect of distractor frequency was observed for vocal and manual tasks, suggesting that the effect arises at a shared, abstract processing level. Consequently, the distractor frequency effect should not be interpreted as evidence for the claim that distractors have to be excluded from an articulatory response buffer before target naming can proceed.