The lexical processing of stress in pseudowords based on the reading of Brazilian Portuguese speakers

Abstract

This work investigated, based on an experimental study, the role of phonological similarity, the frequency of occurrence of the base word and the final syllable in the attribution of primary stress in pseudowords based on the production of native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese. The pseudoword creation metric was based on the study by Protopapas et al. (2006). The words from which the pseudowords were created had a high or low frequency of occurrence, three syllables in length. Four experimental groups were compared: i. similar high frequency; ii. high frequency dissimilar; iii. similar low frequency; and iv. low frequency dissimilar. It was hypothesized that similar high-frequency pseudowords would trigger more analogical processes than dissimilar pseudowords. 34 speakers participated in the study, in a reading task. The results demonstrated that the similarity between real words and pseudowords triggers analogical processes with the extension of the stress pattern and that the frequency of occurrence of the target word and the final syllable are also relevant. Such results provide evidence that the stress is stored together with the word (that is, it is lexical) and that the segmental, syllabic and stress levels interact in determining the place where the stress falls.