Only the shadower knows: Comment on Hamburger and Slowiaczek (1996)

The phonological priming effect may reflect basic processes in spoken, word perception and has thus been a central topic of recent research. In this journal, Hamburger and Slowiaczek (1996) reported phonological priming data collected in a shadowing task. They replicated a prior study (Slowiaczek & Hamburger; 1992), but added new procedures to minimize bias. After observing inhibitory priming in a "low-expectancy" condition, they concluded that facilitatory priming reflects perceptual/response bias, but that inhibitory priming reflects automatic processes of lexical access. This commentary critiques Hamburger and Slowiaczek 's method and presents new data. that demonstrate persistent biases in primed shadowing. I suggest that such biases reflect natural, context-sensitive listening strategies.