Semantic priming in deep-phonological dyslexia: contrasting effects of association and similarity upon abstract and concrete word reading.

We report a series of experiments investigating the reading abilities of a patient R.O.M. who exhibited the syndrome of deep-phonological dyslexia. In a series of semantic priming tasks, R.O.M. was requested to read word lists containing either abstract or concrete words, which were related by semantic similarity or semantic association, or which shared no clear semantic relationship. R.O.M. read semantically similar concrete words significantly more accurately than unrelated items, but showed no such advantage for semantically associated concrete words. By contrast, semantically associated abstract words were read significantly more accurately than unrelated items, but there was no evidence of priming for semantically similar abstract words. Thus, we describe an attempt to harness semantic priming to find converging evidence for a distinction between the representational frameworks underpinning abstract and concrete concepts. The findings are considered in the context of competing theories of the abstract/concrete distinction.