Is the Lexical Boost Due to the Recency of the Repeated Word: Experimental Data

In two structural priming experiments, participants read a Dutch prime sentence aloud, followed by a Dutch target fragment that they had to complete using pictures. Prime sentences were either double object (DO) or prepositional object (PO) ditransitive structures such as “Gauw bracht de arts de masseur een handdoek/een handdoek aan de masseur” (Quickly brought doctor the masseur a towel/a towel to the masseur). Targets consisted of sentence fragments that could be completed using either a DO or PO structure (e.g., “Onlangs leende de boxer …” Recently lent the boxer … with pictures of a boxer, shirt and football). In Experiment 1, we manipulated (1) the prime structure (DO or PO) and (2) whether the prime and target had the same subject noun (e.g., boxer). In Experiment 2, we manipulated whether the prime and target had the same verb (e.g., leende) or not, in addition to manipulating the prime structure. In both experiments, we scored whether participants completed the target fragments with a prepositional object or double object structure and used this as the dependent measure.