Evidence for a Direct Orthography-to-phonology Route in Reading

Many reading theorists acknowledge the existence of a direct lexical reading route (Southwood & Chatterjee, 1999; Friedman & Kohn, 1990; Coslett, 1991). Information fed forward from the orthographic input lexicon (OIL) directly constrains a word in the phonological output lexicon (POL) without activating its semantic information (Sartori, Masterson & Job, 1987; Funnell, 1983). Traditionally, this route is lexical because it does not mediate nonword reading (Ellis & Young, 1988). However, the existence of this route and its role in reading remain somewhat contentious.