WORD-UNIT ANALYSIS DURING VISUAL WORD RECOGNITION IN YOUNG AND ELDERLY ADULTS

Young and elderly adults made lexical decisions about words (e.g., stand). pseudowords (e.g., blant), and nonwords (e.g., dgrtwx) presented at various orientations from upright (i.e., 0-degrees, 30-degrees. 60-degrees, 90-degrees, 120-degrees). Young adults processed letter strings at both the 30-degrees and 60-degrees orientations as efficiently as at the 0-degrees orientation, replicating Koriat and Norman (1985). Elderly adults, however, could only process letter strings up to the 30-degrees orientation as efficiently as they could at the 0-degrees orientation. Latency increased substantially for older adults when stimuli were presented at and beyond the 60-degrees orientation mark. These results are discussed with regard to age-related similarities and differences in lexical processing.