Manipulating instructions strategically affects reliance on the ventral-lexical reading stream: Converging evidence from neuroimaging and reaction time

► We examined effects of Instructions, Word Type, and WF on naming fMRI BOLD and RT. ► Name words instructions increased (1) reliance on the ventral-lexical stream and (2) the WF RT effect. ► RT analyses showed overadditive interactions (INST * WF, WF * WT) and additive effects (INST + WF). ► The overall results support cascaded, dual-stream (ventral-lexical, dorsal-sublexical) models. ► Our results provide a challenge to single-mechanism, parallel distributed processing models.