bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Vocalization-at-presentation and Immediate Recall, with Varying Recall Methods
Authors: Murray D. J.
Published: July 2007

In a free recall situation, written recall is superior to spoken recall, and evidence is adduced suggesting that this may be partly due to the fact that this method of recall permits greater freedom in ordering the material. Evidence is also adduced suggesting that voicing the material at presentation gives superior recall because of a facilitatory effect on storage. This interpretation is supported by the finding that the advantage of vocalizing is not affected by prior knowledge as to whether recall is to be oral or written, and by the suggestion that vocalized lists are more resistant to intra-trial interference than nonvocalized lists. In addition, two earlier observations were confirmed: first, that the advantage of voicing is most marked at fast rates of presentation; and secondly, voicing gives rise to a higher proportion of acoustic errors relative to the number of items incorrectly attempted.
Vigilance—Arousal vs. Reinforcement
Authors: Micko Hans Christoph
Published: July 2007

Task-irrelevant stimuli (projected jokes, which were difficult to read) received an increasing attention as the auditory vigilance session progressed. This result supports reinforcement theories at the cost of activation theory of vigilance.
Spontaneous Alternation and Pattern of Reinforcement
Authors: Still A. W.
Published: July 2007

In Experiment I, rats were given one pair of trials per day in a T-maze; group RN were rewarded on the first trial only, NR were rewarded on the second trial only, while RR were rewarded on both trials. Alternation was approximately the same for all groups, and there was little decline in alternation over 28 days. There was, however, a difference in the choice behaviour on trials when rats failed to alternate, NR and RR, but not RN, choosing according to a position preference. These results are incompatible with several earlier theories of spontaneous alternation, and the hypothesis was put forward that alternation is initially part of an exploratory tendency, but that, when the maze becomes explored, the exploratory tendency dies down, and alternation only continues when rats have been reinforced (primarily or secondarily) for alternating. This hypothesis was tested in a second experiment, similar to the first but in which one group of rats was not rewarded on either trial; as predicted, this group showed significantly more decline in alternation than rewarded rats.
Learning and Retention of Word-pairs with Varying Degrees of Association
Authors: Heim A. W. , Watts K. P. , Bower I. B. , Hawton K. E.
Published: July 2007

The main aim of this experiment was to compare the role of degree of meaningfulness with that of frequency of repetition, in the learning and retention of word-pairs. The (student) subjects were divided into three groups. The first group learned 25 word-pairs whose members were frequently and highly meaningfully associated with each other. The second group learned 25 word-pairs which were associated far less frequently and meaningfully whilst those of the third group were as lacking in associative value as possible. The stimulus-words were ambiguous; they were identical for each of the three groups; the word-pairs were presented, in randomized order, repeatedly, during the learning stage until the subject achieved the criterion of 20 (or more) correct word-pairs. After an interval of 60-90 days, the subjects were retested for retention.

The results indicated that degree of meaningfulness plays a greater role than does frequency of repetition, both in learning and in recall; that the role of repetition tends to increase, however, as the meaningfulness of the material decreases; and that individual differences in method of learning increase with the difficulty of the material to be learned.
Payoff: A Neglected Factor in Reaction Time Measurement
Authors: Annett John
Published: July 2007

The aim of this paper is to point out some implications of implicit or explicit payoffs in reaction time experiments. In any psychophysical task the subject is given a set of instructions which define the desired performance, as it were the rules of the game. Instructions may be supplemented by knowledge of results which further define the required performance. When performance admits of being “good” or “bad,” however wide these limits, the instructions may be said to define, explicitly or implicitly, a system of payoffs. In reaction time experiments the subject is instructed, amongst other things, to respond as soon as possible after the stimulus but never before it. These instructions could equally well be represented by a system of payoffs and Figure 1 illustrates the kind of payoff system normally implied in these instructions. If S represents the time at which the physical stimulus occurs the graph shows a fixed penalty for anticipations (response before S), maximum positive score for responses immediately following S declining at an arbitrary rate as a function of elapsed time between S and the response until an unacceptably long time involves a constant maximum penalty. Some experimenters choose to treat very short RT's as anticipations. This is represented by the dashed line in Figure 1, but it should be clear that payoff values are, to a certain extent, arbitrary.
Further Experiments on Movement Masking
Authors: Grindley G. C. , Townsend Valerie
Published: July 2007

Voluntary attention to one of two static objects in the peripheral field of one eye makes this object more liable to masking by a moving object in the corresponding area of the field of the other eye (Experiment 1).

Positive after images (and probably negative after images) are subject to (binocular) movement masking (Experiment 2).

Movement masking can occur in the field of either eye, but with the displays so far tried the inhibitory influence of a moving object is less in the field of the eye to which it is shown than in the field of the other eye (Experiment 3).
Errors of Commission as a Function of Age and Temperament in a Type of Vigilance Task
Authors: Tune G. S.
Published: July 2007

Forty subjects monitored a 40 min. series of 10-sec. intervals containing digits (spoken at the rate of 1 per sec.), each followed by 10-sec. silence. The task was to report whether or not three consecutive and different odd digits occurred. Responses were forced. The results showed that there was no correlation between either age or temperament and the number of correct detections made. Older subjects, however, made more errors of commission, and were less able to distinguish wanted from unwanted events. The younger and introverted subjects appeared to be more cautious. The data is discussed in terms of the arousal theory of vigilance performance.
Selective Attention: Perception or Response?
Authors: Treisman Anne , Geffen Gina
Published: July 2007

Does our limited capacity in selective listening tasks arise primarily in perception or in response organization? To examine this, subjects were given two dichotic messages, one primary and one secondary, and had to make two different responses: the primary response was to “shadow” the primary message; the secondary response was to tap on hearing certain target words in either message. Since the secondary response was identical for the two messages, any difference in its efficiency with the two messages must be due to a failure in perception of the secondary message. Any interference between the primary and secondary responses (repeating and tapping) to target words in the primary message must be due to a limit in performing simultaneous responses, since if either was correctly performed the target word must have been perceived. The results clearly showed that the main limit is perceptual.

Various target words were used to investigate the nature of the perceptual and response limits. Factors investigated were (1) the information content of the target words, (2) their range of meanings, (3) their grammatical class, and (4) the compatibility between stimuli and responses. A relative lack of response competition was found, which might be due to successive organization of the two responses at different stages in the perceptual sequence. The results were interpreted in terms of signal detection theory and the effects of reduced signal-to-noise ratio produced by inattention were compared with those produced by an external masking noise.
Choice Reaction Time to Single Digits, Spelled Numbers, “Right” and “Wrong” Arithmetic Problems and Short Sentences
Authors: North Jane A. , Grant David A. , Fleming Robert A.
Published: July 2007

Average RT to single number stimuli were found to differ significantly, with the shorter RTs being evoked by 1, 2, 6, and 9. The relationship was most marked when the numbers were presented visually as digits but held also when the numbers were printed as words.

RT for classification of simple three-digit addition and subtraction problems as correctly or incorrectly added or subtracted was shortest for correct additions and about equal for incorrect additions and correct and incorrect subtractions, implying a difference in processing of these forms of information. Similarly, dubitably false sentences were more slowly classified as “true” or “false” than were indubitably false sentences and either dubitably or indubitably true sentences.
Reaction Time to a Second Stimulus as a Function of Intensity of the First Stimulus
Authors: Smith Marilyn C.
Published: July 2007

Reaction time (RT) to the second of two stimuli presented in rapid succession was examined as a function of the intensity of the first stimulus (S1). It was found that the delay in RT2 was greater following a dim first stimulus than following a bright first stimulus. The magnitude of this increase corresponded to the difference in RTs to the two intensity levels of S1. These results support the prediction of a single channel model of response selection. Examination of mean first RTs revealed a general elevation in latency of RT. However, since this increase was not influenced by the inter-stimulus interval (ISI) or by the intensity of the second stimulus (S2), and since the same increase was found on “catch trials“ where no S2 was presented, this increase is considered to be a function of change in set in the double response situation.
Shorter Articles and Notes Conservation of Quantity in Children: The Effect of Vocabulary and Participation
Authors: Cohen Gillian M.
Published: July 2007

In this pilot experiment some new tests for conservation of quantity were devised. The experimental group given these tests was able to make correct judgements, while a control group, matched for age and intelligence, failed to show conservation of quantity in the standard tests used by Piaget. The difference between the tests was analysed, and some factors emerged which, it is suggested, can serve to facilitate the child's performance.
Perimetric Study of Field Defects in Monkeys after Cortical and Retinal Ablations
Authors: Cowey Alan
Published: July 2007

Monocular visual field defects were studied in two monkeys. In one, the macular retina was destroyed by photocoagulation, producing a central scotoma and consistent 5° eccentric fixation. In a second animal the effects of removal of macular projection area in striate cortex and subsequent photocoagulation of the macula were compared. The cortical operation produced a partial field defect, i.e. a region of diminished sensitivity but not a scotoma, which became with practice much smaller than the region of retina whose primary projection area had been ablated. A 10° eccentric fixation was observed. Following the second, retinal, operation a macular scotoma was demonstrated whose size and position corresponded closely with the area of retinal destruction as determined by photography of the fundus and later histological examination of the retina.
The Time Course of Preparation*
Authors: Bertelson Paul
Published: July 2007

The time course of the adjustments triggered by a warning signal was studied by measuring choice reaction times (RTs) at different predictable foreperiods after such a signal. Before the warning signal, a high time uncertainty situation was created by imposing either a long constant foreperiod of 5 sec. or one varying in the range 1.5 to 5 sec. The warning signal was a click. Foreperiods ranging from 0 to 300 millisec. were used in different blocks of trials. The stimulus was the onset of one of two lamps calling for the pressing of one of two keys. A control condition, without click, was used also. RTs were found to decrease continuously when the forperiod was increased from 0 to 100-150 millisec. The click delivered simultaneously with the stimulus permitted reactions significantly faster than in the control condition. It is concluded (a) that the latency of preparation can be much shorter than the 2 to 4 sec. reported by Woodrow; (b) that the warning signal can be used as a time cue to start preparatory adjustments without starting a refractory period of the order of magnitude found in experiments with pairs of successive reactions, and thus that such refractory periods are not the inevitable cost of paying attention to a signal. There is also some suggestion that in this situation the click not only triggers preparatory adjustments, but also causes an immediate facilitation of the reaction to the visual stimulus.
Redundancy Effects in Short-Term Memory
Authors: Corcoran D. W. J. , Weening D. L.
Published: July 2007

Five experiments are reported whose purpose was to demonstrate that short-term memory is improved by redundancy within the material. In Experiment I “tune” containing two, three, four and five tones of differing frequencies had to be coded into digits 1–5, to indicate the order of the pitches in a tune. Performance on stimuli containing correlated amplitude and duration were compared with the uni-dimensional condition. Experiment II repeated I, but required intensity to be coded. Experiment III required pitch coding under three conditions including that when amplitude and frequency were uncorrelated, and compared the performance of musically trained subjects with nonmusicians. Experiment IV repeated III, but subjects were informed of the relation between dimensions. Experiment V involved “shadowing” the tunes by whistling simultaneously with the stimulus.

It was concluded (a) that intercorrelation improves, but zero correlation impairs short-term memory; (b) that knowledge of the relation between dimensions improves performance in the correlated condition, but does not prevent impairment under zero correlation; and (c) the performance of musically trained subjects exceeds that of controls and is unaffected by the presence of a correlated or uncorrelated dimension.
Shorter Articles and Notes Left-Right Differences in Auditory Perception of Verbal and Non-Verbal Material by Children
Authors: Bakker Dirk J.
Published: July 2007

One hundred and twenty children, 60 boys and 60 girls, varying in age between 6 and 12 years were presented with a series of digits and Morse-like sound patterns to each ear separately. As predicted, sound patterns were found to better retained when presented to the left ear than when presented to the right ear. Series of digits however were not retained better via the right ear than via the left ear. The dominance of the left ear for non-verbal material decreases with increasing age. For verbal material a quadratic relation between the dominance of the right ear and age was established.
Selective Attention and Cerebral Dominance in Perceiving and Responding to Speech Messages
Authors: Treisman Anne , Geffen Gina
Published: July 2007

The effect of attention on cerebral dominance and the asymmetry between left and right ears was investigated using a selective listening task. Right handed subjects were presented with simultaneous dichotic speech messages; they shadowed one message in either the right or left ear and at the same time tapped with either the right or the left hand when they heard a specified target word in either message. The ear asymmetry was shown only when subjects' attention was focused on some other aspect of the task: they tapped to more targets in the right ear, but only when these came in the non-shadowed message; they made more shadowing errors with the left ear message, but chiefly for non-target words. The verbal response of shadowing showed the right ear dominance more clearly than the manual response of tapping. Tapping with the left hand interfered more with shadowing than tapping with the right hand, but there was little correlation between the degree of hand and of ear asymmetry over individual subjects. The results support the idea that the right ear dominance is primarily a quantitative difference in the distribution of attention to left and right ear inputs reaching the left hemisphere speech areas. This affects both the efficiency of speech perception and the degree of response competition between simultaneous verbal and manual responses.
Effects of Number of Alternatives on the Psychological Refractory Period
Authors: Karlin Lawrence , Kestenbaum Richard
Published: July 2007

The effects of changing the number of choices in the first response on “psychological refractoriness” were found to be partially consistent with intermittency theory but modifications may be needed to explain the results when the number of choices in the second response is increased.
Chance Results in Utrocular Discrimination
Authors: Templeton W. B. , Green F. A.
Published: July 2007

A review is made of studies on whether we know with which eye we are seeing. The almost total failure to achieve chance results is ascribed to lack of control of convergence and it is shown that such control completely eliminates discrimination.
How Does Acoustic Similarity Influence Short-Term Memory?
Authors: Baddeley A. D.
Published: July 2007

This study attempts to discover why items which are similar in sound are hard to recall in a short-term memory situation. The input, storage, and retrieval stages of the memory system are examined separately. Experiments I, II and III use a modification of the Peterson and Peterson technique to plot short-term forgetting curves for sequences of acoustically similar and control words. If acoustically similar sequences are stored less efficiently, they should be forgotten more rapidly. All three experiments show a parallel rate of forgetting for acoustically similar and control sequences, suggesting that the acoustic similarity effect does not occur during storage. Two input hypotheses are then examined, one involving a simple sensory trace, the other an overloading of a system which must both discriminate and memorize at the same time. Both predict that short-term memory for spoken word sequences should deteriorate when the level of background noise is increased. Subjects performed both a listening test and a memory test in which they attempted to recall sequences of five words. Noise impaired performance on the listening test but had no significant effect on retention, thus supporting neither of the input hypotheses. The final experiments studied two retrieval hypotheses. The first of these, Wickelgren's phonemic-associative hypotheses attributes the acoustic similarity effect to inter-item associations. It predicts that, when sequences comprising a mixture of similar and dissimilar items are recalled, errors should follow acoustically similar items. The second hypothesis attributes the effect to the overloading of retrieval cues which consequently do not discriminate adequately among available responses. It predicts maximum error rate on, not following, similar items. Two experiments were performed, one involving recall of visually presented letter sequences, the other of auditorily presented word sequences. Both showed a marked tendency for errors to coincide with acoustically similar items, as the second hypothesis would predict. It is suggested that the acoustic similarity effect occurs at retrieval and is due to the overloading of retrieval cues.
Response Decrement as a Function of Effort
Authors: Fischer Gloria , Viney Wayne , Knight James , Johnson Neil
Published: July 2007

Albino rats were given acquisition training on a 6 ft. enclosed straight alley runway which could be adjusted for inclinations of 0°, 20°, and 40°. After receiving equal training on each of the three effort conditions, three groups of subjects were given massed extinction trials for 30 min. on only one effort condition. Results indicated fewer responses during extinction under the greater effort conditions. These results support a relation between effort and response decrement in extinction, consistent with the predictions of Hull's theory of reactive inhibition.
Effect of Interpolated Extinction after Partial Delay of Reward Training on Subsequent Reacquisition and Extinction
Authors: Surridge C. Thomas , Mock Karen R. , Amsel Abram
Published: July 2007

Four groups of albino rats were run four trials a day in a straight runway for 44 days. On the first 15 days, two groups were given continuous immediate reward (IR) and two groups a 50 per cent, schedule of 30-sec. partial delay of reward (PDR). On the next 15 days, one IR group and one PDR group were extinguished, while the other IR and PDR groups remained on their original schedules. In the third phase, all groups received 8 days of training on IR. Finally, all groups were given 6 days of extinction training. In the first extinction, PDR produced greater resistance to extinction than IR. In the second extinction period, the PDR group which had previously been given extinction and the two IR groups extinguished relatively rapidly and at approximately the same rates, while the PDR group which had not been extinguished was significantly more resistant to extinction than the other three groups.
Cognitive Categories and Memory Span: II. The Effect of Temporal vs. Categorical Recall
Authors: Sanders A. F. , Schroots J. J. F.
Published: July 2007

Subjects were presented with mixed lists of elements chosen from at least two formally distinct cognitive categories and were instructed to recall either temporally (i.e. in the actual order of arrival), or categorically (i.e. first all elements of one category followed by those of the other). Temporal recall is found to be superior when the categories are even and uneven digits; categorical recall is better when consonants and tones or consonants and spatial positions are mixed. Approximately equal performance is found with consonants and digits. It is suggested that efficiency of recall strategy depends on the relative strength of pre-existing associative bonds between elements from different cognitive categories. When these connections are weaker the probability increases that class membership rather than succession in time determines the assimilation of the list. It is found that with consonants and digits it does not matter whether instruction is given before or after presentation. This suggests that both recall modes can be activated at the same time. The implication of this result for work on dichotic listening is discussed.
Familiarity and Word Recognition
Authors: Garton R. F. , Allen L. R.
Published: July 2007

Word recognition was examined for physics and non-physics students after a single visual presentation of a series of sixty words. Physics words likely to be familiar only to physics subjects were used to vary the prior familiarity of the two groups with the inspection material and the ratio of physics to common words (salience) was varied for each of the three inspection series. Common words, which were expected to have greater salience than physics words in one of the inspection series, were not found to be recognized better than the control pairings of physics words by either group of subjects. The absence of differences between physics and non-physics students in the number of inspection list words (positive instances) correctly identified supports the view that prior familiarity is not a critical variable when all inspection items are presented in a recognition test. Physics students made fewer errors than non-physics students in identifying both physics and common words in the the recognition test which were not in an inspection series (negative instances). It is suggested that the correct identification of negative instances involves a scanning of a subject's “internal store” of previously experienced inspection items and that this is more efficient when the meaning of all the items in this “store” is known.
Letter-Naming time as a Function of Set Familiarity and Symbol Distinctiveness
Authors: Hershberger W. A. , Trantina P. R. , Cosgrove Kathy
Published: July 2007

Two symbol-naming experiments were conducted assessing the dependence of Fitts and Switzer's set-familiarity effect upon symbol distinctiveness. Sixty college males named printed letters presented in a strobotron tachistoscope, the letter always being selected from a preannounced set of three. A voice key detected the response. Experiment I found the Fitts and Switzer finding to be a joint effect: response latency for naming the symbol B in the unfamiliar but distinctive set, VBO, was intermediate to that for the familiar distinctive set, ABC, and the unfamiliar, homolographic set, PBE, the two sets used by Fitts and Switzer. Experiment II, a factorial combination of set familiarity and symbol distinctiveness yielded a significant interaction such that with homolographic symbols, set familiarity was associated with an increase in reaction time. The results were interpreted as consistent with an hypothesis that the set-familiarity effect relates to symbol-identification time as opposed to response-identification time.
Direct Measures of Short-Term Visual Storage
Authors: Haber Ralph Norman , Standing L. G.
Published: July 2007

Two experiments, involving seven conditions, explored the use of direct measures of visual persistence. In each, the subject was asked to judge if an intermittent stimulus appeared perceptually continuous, or whether it completely faded before the next presentation occurred. The first experiment showed that visual persistence was set at approximately 250 msec. for a recycling presentation of a circle in a tachistoscope; in another task employing a moving opaque slit passing back and forth over a circle, persistence times averaged 50 msec. longer. Reducing luminance by 2 log units increased persistence only slightly, though removing the adapting field increased it by over 100 msec. The second experiment, using the repeating circle, varied the duration of the stimulus, and compared monoptic with dichoptic presentations. Visual persistence was found to be independent of stimulus duration over a range of 4 to 200 msec., where all durations were above recognition threshold for the stimulus. Persistence was unaffected whether the stimulus was repeatedly presented in the same eye or alternated between eyes, strongly suggesting that the storage is central. Finally, a re-analysis of Dodwell and Engel's paper on stereopsis suggests that their effects can be adequately explained by visual persistence of the asynchronous stereo pairs, rather than a more complex fusion model. All of these results strongly support the use of visual persistence as a direct measure of short-term visual storage.
Discrimination of Checkerboard Patterns by Rats
Authors: Sutherland N. S. , Williams Clare
Published: July 2007

Fifteen rats were trained to discriminate between a regular checkerboard pattern and a similar pattern containing a “mistake.” The animals subsequently transferred to many other pairs of regular and irregular patterns differing widely from the originals. The results suggest that rats can induce and store highly abstract rules describing input patterns.
Memory While Shadowing
Authors: Norman Donald A.
Published: July 2007

Subjects were asked to repeat verbally (shadow) English words which were presented to one ear. They were then tested for their memory of two-digit numbers which were presented to their other ear. It is demonstrated that subjects have no memory for these digits if they must continue to shadow for 20 sec. before being tested on their memory for the digits. However, if tested immediately after the digit presentation, they do remember some digits. Hence, verbal material presented on non-attended channels gets into a short-term memory, but is not transferred into long-term memory.
Control of Movement Patterns in Animals
Authors: Hinde Robert A.
Published: July 2007

As a more junior Fellow of the same college in Cambridge as Sir Frederic Bartlett, I am especially glad of this opportunity to join with members of the Experimental Psychology Society in honouring him. It would be superfluous for me to speak here of Sir Frederic's academic achievements: so many of our members are engaged in research on problems which sprung from his pioneering work, and his influence on the development of psychology as a science certainly needs no elaboration by me. But I would like to make one personal remark. I suppose all younger men feel that there are just a very few members of the preceding generation who have achieved a stature which will always be beyond the reach of any of their own contemporaries. Sir Frederic has always been one of those for me. I am speaking here not only of his academic achievements, but of his kindness as a man; and I would like to tell him how much I valued his willingness to share some of the benefits of his experience when I was blundering about on the borders of his subject.
Are Thresholds Reduced by Illusions? An Attempt at Replication
Authors: Dodwell P. C. , Standing L. G. , Thio Harriet
Published: July 2007

Three experiments are reported, which are attempts to replicate the finding of Ross and Gregory (1964) that difference thresholds for weights can be lowered by means of the size-weight illusion. Three different procedures were used, the first one (experiment I) being designed to show whether or not changes in a subject's judgement criterion could account for apparent changes in sensitivity. The second method (Experiment II) was a replication of Ross and Gregory's first procedure, in which the standard weight was judged before the comparison. In Experiments I and II a larger illusion was induced than in the original studies, but in Experiment III both the weights and container sizes were practically identical to those used by Ross and Gregory. The procedure was also the same as their most successful procedure (number 3) in which standard and comparison were judged simultaneously. The findings were uniformly negative: there was no evidence of criterion shift when the size-weight illusion was induced nor did we find the lowering of threshold previously reported.
Temporal Grouping, Rehearsal and Short-Term Memory
Authors: Ryan Joanna
Published: July 2007

The effects of temporal grouping on auditory short-term memory are investigated, using pauses of different lengths to indicate the groups. No quantitative or qualitative differences were found between the shorter and longer pauses. This result, in conjunction with an analysis of the order errors, is used to suggest what kind of processing occurs during the pauses. This processing is selective, recoding the information about order according to position within a group.
Size Constancy in Monkeys with Inferotemporal Lesions
Authors: Humphrey N. K. , Weiskrantz L.
Published: July 2007

In a study of size constancy, monkeys were trained with extended practice to choose the larger of two projected stimulus discs independently of distance. When surgical brain lesions were made following pre-operative training, it was found that posterior parietal lesions caused no deficit on this task while inferotemporal lesions caused a severe breakdown from which three out of four animals showed almost no recovery. Mathematical analysis showed that the pattern of performance after inferotemporal lesions could be described as due to a tendency to oscillate between a “correct” and two “incorrect strategies” and that this tendency was also apparent to at least some extent in the unoperated animals. It is argued that the two incorrect strategies might have resulted from a disturbance of size constancy, such that the animal became unable to use both retinal size and distance information in computing physical size and instead used either retinal size or distance information alone. Parallels are drawn between such an hypothetical perceptual disorder and certain clinical disturbances in man.
Matching Latencies for Word-Shape Pairs
Authors: Seymour Philip H. K.
Published: July 2007

Four word-shape pairs, circle/CIRCLE, square/SQUARE, circle/SQUARE, square/CIRCLE, were presented under conditions of simultaneous onset to 48 subjects. Subjects were instructed to report whether the pair could be classified as same or different by saying “yes” or “no” as rapidly as possible. Latencies of these judgements were measured from the simultaneous onset of the displays to the initiation of the subject's verbal response. The pair circle/CIRCLE was reported as same faster than the pair square/SQUARE. No consistent differences were obtained between the two mismatching pairs. However, latencies to report a mismatch were consistently longer than latencies to report a match.
Proactive Interference and Spontaneous Alternation in Rats
Authors: Still A. W.
Published: July 2007

Two pairs of trials were given to naive rats in a T-maze. The first trial of a pair was forced to one arm, the second was free, and the delay between trials was 25 min. or 10 hr. Rats left in the maze for 15 sec. following the forced choice showed increased alternation on the second pair of trials at the 25-min. delay as compared with the 10-hr. delay. This was interpreted as due to a decline in alternation with delay on this pair of trials, together with an overall increase in alternation between the first and second pairs, and is consistent with the proactive interference theory of forgetting. Rats left in for 2 min. showed a decline in alternation with delay on the first pair of trials, but not on the second; this is inconsistent with the proactive interference theory.
Age Differences in Recognition Memory
Authors: Craik Fergus I. M.
Published: July 2007

It is generally believed that short-term memory (STM) performance decreases from maturity to old age, but the present paper questions the generality of this conclusion. The first experiment reported is a short-term recognition probe study—no significant age differences were found in either acquisition or the rate of forgetting. It is suggested that age decrements in STM are limited to situations where attention is divided at input or where the material must be manipulated during storage. Experiment II confirmed previous findings of minimal age losses in secondary memory word recognition. The results of this second study support the conclusion that there is poorer accessibility to stored verbal material with advancing age.
Waiting for the Stimulus Suffix: Decay, Delay, Rhythm, and Readout in Immediate Memory
Authors: Crowder Robert G.
Published: July 2007

The degree to which a redundant suffix impairs performance on digit lists depends on the delay between the last memory item and the suffix. A set of three experiments is offered, establishing the inadequacy of hypotheses based on simple decay of prelinguistic information, passage of time before recall, and rhythmic periodicities in attention. The delayed suffix effect is consistent with a fourth hypothesis whose emphasis is on access to precategorical auditory information through a “readout” process rather than on the sheer availability of such information.
Stationary Visual Texture and the Estimation of Slant Angle
Authors: Phillips Richard J.
Published: July 2007

Gibson (1950a) has suggested that a gradient of retinal stimulation from an irregularly textured surface is used in the estimation of slant. There are several measures that could form such a gradient. Eight pictures of slanting surfaces were constructed with the aid of a computer. These consisted only of texture elements: in this case, outline circles and ellipses. Subjects studied pairs of pictures and indicated which had the greater tilt. By varying separately the gradients of element size and element density, it was possible to show that only the former contributed appreciably to the impression of slant. Only some of the measures considered are consistent with this result.
Effort Expenditure during Proportionally Reinforced Responding
Authors: Filion Ross D. L. , Fowler Stephen C. , Notterman J. M.
Published: July 2007

A bar-pressing experiment was carried out in which laboratory rats were reinforced approximately in direct proportion to the level of time integral of force (“effort”) exerted per response. Over the course of training, the subjects increased in efficiency, as measured by amount of food obtained per unit effort exerted. It was not demonstrated, however, that the animals learned to take advantage of the effort-proportional reinforcement contingency.
Consonant Recognition with two Levels of Decision Complexity
Authors: Holloway C. M.
Published: July 2007

The perceptual tuning hypothesis can be expressed as a prediction that discrimination of a particular stimulus dimension will be enhanced if it is the only dimension requiring discrimination and not one of a set of dimensions in a multidimensional discrimination task. In previous tests of the tuning hypothesis, using speech material, the size of a message set has been manipulated as an indirect means of controlling the number of dimensions an observer is required to discriminate. In the present experiments the particular items appearing in a message set have been selected in order to control precisely the number of dimensions relevant to the discrimination task, and performance is estimated in terms of the discrimination of each relevant dimension. No evidence is found for a perceptual tuning effect even though it is argued that the conditions of the present experiment represent those most favourable for its elicitation.
A Questionnaire Technique for Investigating Very Long Term Memory
Authors: Warrington Elizabeth K. , Silberstein M.
Published: July 2007

A questionnaire technique, based on public events, for quantifying memory over long periods of time, is described. Independent groups of subjects were tested at intervals of six months on a recall and multiple choice version of the questionnaire. A consistent relationship between memory and both age of subject and passage of time was found. An error analysis is presented.
Conditioned Suppression of Avoidance Behaviour in Rats
Authors: Blackman D. E.
Published: July 2007

Six rats were exposed to schedules of free-operant shock avoidance. For three of these, auditory or visual stimuli were present continuously throughout each experimental session. For the remaining three rats, these stimuli were presented only 5 sec. before an avoidable shock, and were removed by any operant response to be emitted during their presence. For these latter rats, the stimuli developed strong discriminative control over the emission of operant responses. When the avoidance behaviour had stabilized, the effects were studied of a stimulus which preceded an unavoidable shock of the same intensity as that maintaining the avoidance responding. These effects were studied in the following conditions: against the ongoing avoidance behaviour; with no avoidance stimuli present; and against extinction of avoidance behaviour. With the animals exposed to continuous schedule stimuli, all these experimental conditions resulted in an acceleration of responding during the signal which preceded an unavoidable shock. The rats with the strong stimulus control of avoidance responding afforded by the discontinuous schedule stimuli never showed such an acceleration; indeed all three animals showed suppression of their operant responding in the final experimental condition. It therefore appears that experience of shock avoidance per se is not sufficient to produce the acceleration effect: the discriminative control of behaviour, or lack of it, is also implicated.
Two Experiments with Artificial Languages
Authors: Smith Philip Twitchell
Published: July 2007

Two experiments are reported where subjects learnt simple artificial languages which contained synonyms: i.e. there were two equally correct verbal responses paired with each “referent” in the language: “referents” were simple visual patterns. In the first experiment (a memory task) subjects performed better with material of low auditory discriminability than with material of high auditory discriminability when they were asked to use one synonym of each pair more often than the other; the reverse was the case when they were asked to use each synonym equally often. In the second experiment (a two-person communication task with a noisy channel) the degree to which pairs of subjects tended to use the same synonym for the same meaning was found to be non-monotonic with the noise level in the communication channel: subjects tended to use the same synonyms for moderately high noise and very low noise more often than they did for very high noise and moderately low noise.

The concept of decision cost (Smith, 1968) is used to explain these results. Decision cost is a complex function both of discriminability and of response bias, and it is proposed that changes in decision cost in response to changes in response bias are responsible for the results observed in these experiments.
Observing Responses and Uncertainty Reduction. II The Effect of Varying the Probability of Reinforcement
Authors: Steiner John
Published: July 2007

The observing response paradigm was used to assess the reinforcing properties of discriminative stimuli by allowing animals either to work for food in the presence of a neutral stimulus or to first make an observing response by pressing a lever. On a progressive ratio schedule this resulted in the appearance of easily discriminable stimuli which marked positive and negative trials. The uncertainty associated with the imposed neutral stimulus was varied by manipulating the proportion of positive and negative trials in the session. The animals switched most often when the probability of reinforcement was low, less often when it was intermediate, and least often when it was high. This was not consistent with an uncertainty reduction hypothesis but could be explained if the uncertainty had to do with response rather than outcome.
Shifting Attention between the Ears
Authors: Treisman Anne M.
Published: July 2007

Subjects were asked to recall lists of digits presented either alternately to right and left ears or successively to both. Performance was worse with alternating than with successive lists and the decrement was greater with the faster presentation rate. However, there was no interaction between type of presentation and either digit length or list length. The latter finding suggests that the effect arises in perception rather than in memory and is consistent with the idea that it takes time to shift attention or reset the parameters for perceptual processing of alternating monaural speech items.
The Effect of Overtraining on Transfer between Tasks Involving the Same Stimulus Dimension
Authors: Winefield A. H. , Jeeves M. A.
Published: July 2007

Two experiments are reported in which transfer effects between two discrimination tasks are examined following differing amounts of training on the first task. The two tasks were a conditional (successive) discrimination involving black/white cues, and a simultaneous brightness discrimination involving the same black/white cues.

In Experiment I the conditional task was presented first and in Experiment II the simultaneous task was presented first. The results of Experiment I show overall negative transfer which is not directly related to the amount of training. The results of Experiment II, however, reveal positive transfer although again the amount of training produced no significant effect. These seemingly discrepant findings are explained in terms of the difficulty of the conditional task and the development of rigid position stereotypes. It is argued that the concept of frustration-instigated behaviour is necessary to account for the results.
Symmetry, Gestalt and Information Theory
Authors: Deregowski J. B.
Published: July 2007

Two kinds of patterns were made up out of crosses. The first kind was symmetrical and the second contained a sub-pattern repeated in the same orientation. Subjects were requested to reproduce the stimuli after viewing them for 2 sec. It was found that there was no difference between the two kinds of stimuli when symmetry about the horizontal axis was involved but that when symmetry about the vertical axis occurred the symmetrical stimuli were reproduced more accurately than the repeated stimuli. Introduction of contrasting colours on the two portions of each pattern decreased the frequency of correct responses, whilst stressing the grid line subdividing the stimuli into two portions containing the same information had no significant effect.
Short Term Retention of Sentences
Authors: Boakes R. A. , Lodwick B.
Published: July 2007

A series of experiments was performed on the interaction between the short-term retention of sentences and of digits. In Experiment I a digit span method was used whereby subjects were presented with a sentence followed by a sequence of digits and were required either (a) to recall the sentence first and then the digits or (b) to recall the digits followed by the sentence. Under condition (a) prior recall of the sentence reduced the percentage of digit sequences correctly recalled, while under condition (b) retention of the sentence appeared to have no effect on digit recall. This last finding was confirmed in Experiment II, where the sentences varied both in grammatical complexity and length.

In Experiment III the effect of prior recall of a sentence on the recall of digits was found to depend on the type of sentence used. A correlation was observed between the size of this effect and the time taken to recall a sentence. The rate of forgetting suggested by this observation was comparable to that obtained in Experiment IV, where subjects performed an intervening task that did not involve immediate memory for sentences in the interval between the presentation and recall of a six-digit sequence.

It was concluded from these results that the short-term retention of sentences and of lists of items cannot be explained in terms of some general store of limited capacity.
Visual Span of Apprehension in Patients with Unilateral Cerebral Lesions
Authors: Warrington Elizabeth K. , Rabin P.
Published: July 2007

The visual span of apprehension for random letter and digit sequences, approximations to English sequences and non-symbolic line stimuli was measured in patients with unilateral cerebral lesions. The left hemisphere group was significantly impaired relative to the right hemisphere group and a control group on all three types of visual span task. The deficit was most marked in patients with left posterior lesions. The visual span deficits were not related to other language deficits. The findings are discussed in terms of a modality-specific defect of visual short-term memory.
Pause Measures during Reading and Recall in Serial List Learning
Authors: Wilkes A. L. , Lloyd P. , Simpson I.
Published: July 2007

An investigation is reported into pausing and grouping during the serial learning of letter strings, when presented randomly by length and when presented in ascending order. Mean pause times for the reading and recall of longer lists were significantly greater than for lists of shorter span due to extended pausing at specific list positions. In general, reading rhythms were duplicated during recall. Subjects were highly consistent in maintaining their level of pause duration across lists and responded to additions in list length by increasing their number of groups, not by increasing group size. Triadic sequences were the most popular form of spontaneous organization. Pausing measures are discussed as indices of organizational strategies.