Abstract
2 experiments were conducted to determine whether words and pictures are coded and processed in different fashions. In Exp. I, reaction times (RTs) of same-different judgments were recorded for pairs of words which differed in syllable length (1 vs 3). RTs were longer for the three-syllable than the one-syllable words, indicating a sequentially organized verbal code. Exp. II employed a pictorial representation of the words used in Exp. I. There was no correlation between RTs and the syllable length of the picture names in Exp. II, suggesting that S employed an imaginal code for the pictures which involved parallel, rather than sequential, processing. The results of both studies were taken as support for Paivio's (1971) dual-coding hypothesis.
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