Showing papers in "Psychological Review in 1978"

Toward a model of text comprehension and production.

Abstract: The semantic structure of texts can be described both at the local microlevel and at a more global macrolevel A model for text comprehension based on this notion accounts for the formation of a coherent semantic text base in terms of a cyclical process constrained by limitations of working memory Furthermore, the model includes macro-operators, whose purpose is to reduce the information in a text base to its gist, that is, the theoretical macrostructure These operations are under the control of a schema, which is a theoretical formulation of the comprehender's goals The macroprocesses are predictable only when the control schema can be made explicit On the production side, the model is concerned with the generation of recall and summarization protocols This process is partly reproductive and partly constructive, involving the inverse operation of the macro-operators The model is applied to a paragraph from a psychological research report, and methods for the empirical testing of the model are developed

A Theory of Memory Retrieval.

Abstract: A theory of memory retrieval is developed and is shown to apply over a range of experimental paradigms. Access to memory traces is viewed in terms of a resonance metaphor. The probe item evokes the search set on the basis of probe-memory item relatedness, just as a ringing tuning fork evokes sympathetic vibrations in other tuning forks. Evidence is accumulated in parallel from each probe-memory item comparison, and each comparison is modeled by a continuous random walk process. In item recognition, the decision process is self-terminating on matching comparisons and exhaustive on nonmatching comparisons. The mathematical model produces predictions about accuracy, mean reaction time, error latency, and reaction time distributions that are in good accord with experimental data. The theory is applied to four item recognition paradigms (Sternberg, prememorized list, study-test, and continuous) and to speed-accuracy paradigms; results are found to provide a basis for comparison of these paradigms. It is noted that neural network models can be interfaced to the retrieval theory with little difficulty and that semantic memory models may benefit from such a retrieval scheme.

Context theory of classification learning.

Abstract: Most theories dealing with ill-defined concepts assume that performance is based on category level information or a mixture of category level and specific item information. A context theory of classificatio n is described in which judgments are assumed to derive exclusively from stored exemplar information. The main idea is that a probe item acts as a retrieval cue to access information associated with stimuli similar to the probe. The predictions of the context theory are contrasted with those of a class of theories (including prototype theory) that assume that the information entering into judgments can be derived from an additive combination of information from component cue dimensions. Across four experiments using both geometric forms and schematic faces as stimuli, the context theory consistently gave a better account of the data. The relation of the context theory to other theories and phenomena associated with ill-defined concepts is discussed in detail. One of the major components of cognitive behavior concerns abstracting rules and forming concepts. Our entire system of naming objects and events, talking about them, and interacting with them presupposes the ability to group experiences into appropriate classes. Young children learn to tell the difference between dogs and cats, between clocks and fans, and between stars and street lights. Since few concepts are formally taught, the evolution of concepts from experience with exemplars must be a fundamental learning phenomenon. The focus of the present article is to explore how such conceptual achievements emerge from individual instances.

Quantitative Analysis of Purposive Systems: Some Spadework at the Foundations of Scientific Psychology

Abstract: The revolution in psychology that cybernetics at one time seemed to promise has been delayed by four blunders: (a) dismissal of control theory as a mere machine analogy, (b) failure to describe control phenomena from the behaving system's point of view, (c) applying the general control system model with its signals and functions improperly identified, and (d) focusing on man-machine systems in which the \"man\" part is conventionally described. A general nonlinear quasi-static analysis of relationships between an organism and its environment shows that the classical stimulus-response, stimulus-organism-response, or antecedent-consequent analyses of behavioral organization are special cases, a far more likely case being a control system type of relationship. Even for intermittent interactions, the control system equations lead to one simple characterization: Control systems control what they sense, opposing disturbances as they accomplish this end. A series of progressively more complex experimental demonstrations of principle illustrates both phenomena and methodology in a control system approach to the quantitative analysis of purposive systems, that is, systems in which the governing principle is control of input.

Concerning the applicability of geometric models to similarity data: The interrelationship between similarity and spatial density.

Abstract: In a recent article, Tversky questioned the application of geometric models to similarity data and proposed an alternative set-theoretic approach. He suggested that geometric models are inappropriate because the similarity data may violate the metric assumptions underlying such models. In addition, he demonstrated that the stimulus context and the nature of the experimental task can affect the similarity relations. The present article suggests that a geometric approach may be compatible with these effects if the traditional multidimensional scaling model is augmented by the assumption that spatial density in the configuration has an effect on the similarity measure. A distance-densi ty model is outlined that assumes that similarity is a function of both interpoint distance and the spatial density of other stimulus points in the surrounding region of the metric space. The proposed relationship between similarity and spatial density is supported by empirical evidence. The distance-density model is shown to be able to account for violations of the metric axioms and certain context and task effects. A number of other issues are discussed with respect to geometric and set-theoretic models of similarity.

Integration of featural information in speech perception.

Abstract: A model for the identification of speech sounds is proposed that assumes that (a) the acoustic cues are perceived independently, (b) feature evaluation provides information about the degree to which each quality is present in the speech sound, (c) each speech sound is denned by a propositional prototype in longterm memory that determines how the featural information is integrated, and (d) the speech sound is identified on the basis of the relative degree to which it matches the various alternative prototypes. The model was supported by the results of an experiment in which subjects identified stop-consonant-vowel syllables that were factorially generated by independently varying acoustic cues for voicing and for place of articulation. This experiment also replicated previous findings of changes in the identification boundary of one acoustic dimension as a function of the level of another dimension. These results have previously been interpreted as evidence for the interaction of the perceptions of the acoustic features themselves. In contrast, the present model provides a good description of the data, including these boundary changes, while still maintaining complete noninteraction at the feature evaluation stage of processing. Although considerable progress has been made in the field of speech perception in recent years, there is still much that is unknown about the details of how speech sounds are perceived and discriminated. In particular, while there has been considerable success in isolating the dimensions of acoustic information that are important in perceiving and identifying speech sounds, very little is known about how the information from the various acoustic dimensions is put together in order to actually accomplish identification. The present article proposes and tests a model of these fundamental integration processes that take place during speech perception. Much of the study of features in speech has focused on the stop consonants of English. The stop consonants are a set of speech sounds

A Theory of Perceptual Matching

Abstract: When two patterns are compared, same judgments typically are faster than different judgments. This result is perplexing because same, but not different, judgments would seem to require full and exhaustive processing. Some models have depicted same processing as more efficient or powerful than different processing due to an identity reporter or to priming. When accuracy rather than reaction time (RT) is examined, however, same processing looks generally less efficient than different processing: Subjects are more likely to make false different responses to same pairs than false same responses to different pairs. The present noisy-operator theory holds that internal noise is more likely to produce spurious featural mismatches than matches and that the rechecking needed to remove these spurious differences produces the typically longer RT for different judgments. Data from comparisons of single-patter n (Cases 1, 2, and 3) or multiletter strings (Cases 4, 5, and 6) were fitted to a single-processor accumulative model based on the theory. This report deals with a deceptively simple task. A person is shown two patterns, either side by side or one after the other, and must decide as rapidly (and accurately) as possible whether they are identical or not. Trials are randomly intermixed, of course, so that the subject never knows beforehand whether he will see a same or different pair. The matching processes involved in this simple task are im

Limits on perception of cognitive processes: A reply to Nisbett and Wilson.

Abstract: Nisbett and Wilson's argument that people do not have access to cognitive processes that cause behavior is criticized on theoretical and methodological grounds. It is argued that Nisbett and Wilson's position is stated in a nonfalsifiable fashion, that they define causality in a way that denies subjects access to such information, that Nisbett and Wilson have no definition of the mental processes that subjects cannot report on, and that there is evidence that people do have access to causal processes. Moreover, several of the studies that Nisbett and his associates conducted to support their position used inappropriate statistical tests. A reanalysis of one such study by Nisbett and Bellows demonstrates clear evidence for subjects' access to their mental processes contrary to the original authors' interpretations. It is recommended that researchers focus not on the question of whether people have access to process but on the more productive question of the conditions of such access. Suggestions for such research are offered. Nisbett and Wilson's (1977) recent Psychological Review article has attracted much attention in social psychology. In a field that values counterintuitive findings highly, Nisbett and Wilson's counterintuitive argument that people have no direct access to their mental processes certainly has the potential to startle and provoke thought. Though counterintuitive, this argument is not totally unexpected. An underlying function of the article appears to be to defend current formulations of attribution theory from a perplexing finding: In certain lines of research (the Storms & Nisbett, 1970, insomnia study or phobia reduction studies, e.g., Valins & Ray, 1967), the effects predicted to be mediated by attribution processes have appeared in subjects' behavior, but verbal self-report measures of attribution have entirely failed to show supporting results. If Nisbett and Wilson's arguments are correct, though, these findings are not damaging to attribution theory,

Twenty years of cognitive dissonance: case study of the evolution of a theory.

Abstract: Recent revisions of cognitive dissonance theory no longer encompass some of the important examples, data, and hypotheses that were part of Festinger's original statement. Further, the psychological character of the motivation for cognitive change can be interpreted, in recent statements of the theory, as a need to preserve self-esteem rather than a need to maintain logic-like consistency among cognitions. These changes are so substantial as to prompt the observation that the evolved theory might be identified as a different theory-in fact, as one that predates cognitive dissonance theory. A final, disturbing thought: What if the original dissonance theory, which has now surrendered its name to somewhat different ideas, was correct?

Theory of behavioral power functions

Abstract: Data in operant conditioning and psychophysics are often well fitted by functions of the form y — qx'. A simple theory derives these power functions from the simultaneous equations dx/x = aif(z)dz and dy/y = a j ( z ) d z , where z is a comparison variable that is equated for the effects of x and y, and Oj and a2 are sensitivity parameters. In operant conditioning, * and y are identified with response rates; in psychophysics, with measures of stimulus and response. The theory can explain converging sets of power functions, solves the dimensional problems with the standard power function, and can account for the relation between Type I and Type II psychophysical scales.