Address for correspondence:

The cognitive system does not just act as a mirror from the sensory input; instead, it tends to normalize this information. Given that letter processing seems to be much more specialized than digit processing in the cortex, we examined whether the regularization process occurs differently from digits to letters than from letters to digits: We employed a masked priming same/different experiment (e.g., probe: VESZED, prime, V35Z3D, and target VESZED). When embedded in letter strings, digits that resemble letters (e.g., 3 and 5 in V35Z3D-VESZED) tend to be encoded in a letter-like manner, whereas when embedded in digit strings, letters that resemble digits (e.g., E and S in 9ES7E2-935732) tend not to be encoded in a digit-like manner. Key words: word recognition, priming, letter processing 2 Letters, words and numbers are cultural inventions of our society which have become an integral part of our daily cognitive operations. Even though our brain efficiently processes letters and digits in similar contexts (e.g., in the expression April 24, 1905), i