The long and the short of it! Naming a set of prime words before a set of related picture targets at two different intertrial intervals

Previous work has shown that naming word primes can subsequently interfere with naming related picture targets in a paradigm that mixes words and pictures together. An experiment is reported in which all the prime words were presented before all the related and unrelated pictures, and picture naming times were measured. The time interval between stimuli was manipulated (either 1 or 4s intervals before next fixation) with the intention of reducing the likelihood of anticipatory strategies or prime elaboration. Analysis of naming times indicated a significant main effect of relatedness, which did not interact with time interval; naming prime words at least 4 trials and potentially up to 33 trials earlier slowed related picture naming times. The interference effect is discussed in relation to competitive accounts of picture name retrieval and a recent postlexical account of semantic interference effects.