FIGURE 1.

Experimental procedure of the word-matching task. In this example, each participant performed a task in which a target word presented at the top of the screen, dove (‘colombe’) had to be paired with one of three reference words, presented at the bottom, according to three possible semantic relationships: (a) typically related word (co-hyponyms) parakeet (‘perruche’); (b) atypically related word (co-hyponyms) albatross (‘albatros’); and (c) functionally related words (F) symbol (‘symbole’). The sorting period was followed by a maintenance feedback signal (green check mark displayed for 2000 ms) indicating that participants should maintain the same semantic rule as in the previous trial. After 5 or 6 maintaining trials, the rule changed (blue screen displayed for 500 ms) and participants had to discover the new classification rule and maintain it. As a control condition, a target card (e.g., AAAA) would be matched with the same sequence (e.g., aaaa) among three reference cards: aaaa, bbbb, cccc.