Word stem priming in unilateral stroke patients: word type and laterality effects.

We explored word type and lesion laterality effects in visual word stem completion priming. Participants were 24 stroke patients (12 left, 12 right) and 11 non-brain damaged, medical controls. Participants studied 32 threatening and 32 nonthreatening words and completed cued recall and word stem priming tasks (Mathews, Mogg, May, & Eysenck, 1989). Stroke groups had lower cued recall than controls and the right hemisphere damaged group was lower in cued recall than the left. Word type did not affect cued recall. Groups were comparable in word stem priming, and there was a word type effect such that more nonthreatening than threatening words were produced. No laterality effects were found in word stem priming. Implications for models of how words are processed during word stem priming are discussed.