Showing papers in "Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology in 1976"
TL;DR: A series of experiments was carried out to explore the hypothesis that a central working memory (WM) system is utilized during verbal reasoning and supported the view that the WM is a general executive system with a limited capacity for information processing.
Abstract: A series of experiments was carried out to explore the hypothesis that a central working memory (WM) system is utilized during verbal reasoning. WM was provisionally defined in terms of two major features of short-term memory (STM): its limited storage capacity and its use of speech-coded information. The reasoning task required subjects to match (verify) as rapidly as possible a sentence of varying grammatical form with a symbolic referent. Experiments I and II studied the effect of storing an additional STM load on sentence verification latencies. As many as six items could be correctly recalled with no slowing of verification speed. Experiment III used a different procedure in which the STM items had to be articulated aloud during verification. In this case six-item STM loads slowed verification speed considerably, and did so more for the more difficult sentences. Only a small non-significant slowing of verification speed was obtained when redundant messages were articulated. Experiment IV showed that ...
230 citations
TL;DR: The Fifth Sir Frederick Bartlett Lecture as mentioned in this paper was given at a meeting of the Experimental Psychology Society in Durham, 8 Apr 1976, and was the first lecture to be published.
Abstract: Text of the Fifth Sir Frederick Bartlett Lecture given at a meeting of the Experimental Psychology Society in Durham, 8Apr1976.
163 citations
TL;DR: These experiments examined the way in which experienced musicians differed from non-musicians in their recognition of briefly exposed pitch notation, and investigated the nature of the abstract code for musicians.
Abstract: Music bears formal relations to language which suggest that perceptual processes in the two modes may also be similar. These experiments examined the way in which experienced musicians differed from non-musicians in their recognition of briefly exposed pitch notation. Experiments I and II together demonstrated that musicians are superior to non-musicians in their immediate written recall of stimuli containing more than three notes, but only when the stimulus is available to them for 150 ms or more. These results are accounted for well by a model proposed by Coltheart (1972) for letter perception under conditions of brief exposure. In this model, two coding processes act simultaneously on the stimulus, one a fast visual coding, and the other a slower, but more permanent abstract (or name) coding. In this case non-musicians appear to be lacking a second, abstract, coding which musicians possess. Experiments III and IV attempted to investigate the nature of the abstract code for musicians by presenting vario...
144 citations
TL;DR: Further evidence is given in support of the hypothesis that right-hemisphere superiority is most apparent in processes leading to identity matching.
Abstract: The dichotomies verbal/visuospatial, serial/parallel and analytic/holistic are reviewed with respect to differences in hemispheric processing. A number of experimental parameters may be varied in such tasks, and together with certain frequently-occurring weaknesses of experimental design may account for the often discrepant results hitherto reported. The above factors are systematically reviewed, and three further experiments are reported which attempt to fill in the missing designs. Further evidence is given in support of the hypothesis that right-hemisphere superiority is most apparent in processes leading to identity matching. It is quantitative rather than qualitative, and may depend upon operations on the entire gestalt, such as holistic matching, mental rotation, reflection, distortion, etc., rather than, e.g., simultaneous (parallel) processing of discretely analysed or isolated features or elements. On the other hand left-hemisphere involvement in visuospatial processing is thought to reflect anal...
107 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors measured the accuracy of recognition for short (three-note) transposed melodic sequences and compared with accuracy predicted by three models of recognition each of which described a different degree of abstraction and synthesis of the musical intervals contained in the sequence.
Abstract: Accuracy of recognition for short (three-note) transposed melodic sequences was measured and compared with accuracy predicted by three models of recognition each of which described a different degree of abstraction and synthesis of the musical intervals contained in the sequence. For subjects with musical training, recognition was best described by a model that assumed abstraction and synthesis of the musical intervals between both adjacent and non-adjacent tones of the sequence. For subjects without musical training, recognition was much less accurate but there was some evidence that intervals between adjacent tones were abstracted. Of major theoretical interest, however, was the finding that none of the models provided a comprehensive account of the data. Not merely the size of the intervals contained in a sequence determines accuracy of recognition of the sequence, but also the order or configuration of the intervals. It is suggested that particular interval configurations facilitate the abstraction of...
106 citations
TL;DR: There was a right hemisphere superiority in discriminability to both hue and saturation in discrimination tasks using lateralized coloured stimuli.
Abstract: Signal detection analysis was performed on data obtained from discrimination tasks using lateralized coloured stimuli. It was found that there was a right hemisphere superiority in discriminability to both hue and saturation.
97 citations
TL;DR: Right, mixed and left-handed college students were given the complete WAIS, and a series of cognitive factor tests, and results showed left- and mixed-handed individuals to have a significantly lower full scale I.Q. than right-handers.
Abstract: Right, mixed and left-handed college students were given the complete WAIS, and a series of cognitive factor tests Results showed left- and mixed-handed individuals to have a significantly lower f
86 citations
TL;DR: The cross-lateral inhibition effect (CIE) features in Kephart's (1971) perceptualmotor theory and has been found to be strongest in children aged 3, 4 and 5 as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Young children asked to make hand movements which cross the body are likely to respond with a movement confined to the same body side as the hand used. This crosslateral inhibition effect (CIE) features in Kephart's (1971) perceptualmotor theory; there is an extensive, earlier, literature on CIE in adults following cerebral insult; since the twenties, attempts have been made to relate developmental, clinical and neuropathological findings. In the present study 120 children aged from 3 to 8 years faced and copied hand movements of a model in a procedure following Head's (1920) Hand, Eye and Ear Test. CIE was confirmed, but differences between groups did not convincingly relate to age. CIE was greatest not at 3, 4 or 5 but at 6 years; further, 4-year-olds subjects made more preferred hand crosslateral responses than any other group. Analysis of imitation performance showed that older subjects applied a “proximity” strategy to both body part touched and hand use, whereas younger subjects disregarded the latt...
71 citations
TL;DR: Differences are found with respect to cognitive bias, sex, age and nationality in the left-handers of Test AH 2/3 which yields subscores on Verbal, Numerical and Perceptual reasoning.
Abstract: 2165 Subjects, ranging from nine-year-old schoolchildren to adult students, took Test AH 2/3 which yields subscores on Verbal, Numerical and Perceptual reasoning. The left-handers are compared with the right-handers, differences being found with respect to cognitive bias, sex, age and nationality.
69 citations
TL;DR: It is argued that both pre-categorical acoustic storage and residual activation effects, engendered in a logogen system by the repetition “structure” of the concurrent tasks, helped to determine the attentional capacity available for secondary (elaborative) rehearsal and, in turn, set the levels of recall.
Abstract: A serial recall experiment comparing visual and auditory presentation is reported which demonstrates that, under certain conditions, there is an auditory advantage in the pre-recency (1–6) as well as the recency (7–8) serial positions. Presentation modality was combined factorially with five levels of a concurrent writing task, which had to be completed for each to-be-remembered digit during presentation: NC, no concurrent task; XX, writing two crosses; DX, writing each digit followed by a cross; XD, the converse of DX; and DD, writing each digit twice. When presentation was visual, there was a monotonic (non-decreasing) trend in the recall errors going from NC to DD (in above order) for both the pre-recency and recency positions on average. With an auditory presentation, however, the trend was more gradual, though still monotonic. For the pre-recency items, an auditory advantage was obtained with conditions XX, XD and DD, but not for NC and DX. Additionally, with an auditory presentation, there was no ev...
45 citations
TL;DR: In two experiments subjects received 100 ms tachistoscopic presentations, either to left or right of fixation, of a rectangular matrix of 12 cells, on each trial three cells were filled, each with a different symbol drawn from a set of 12 letters and digits.
Abstract: In two experiments subjects received 100 ms tachistoscopic presentations, either to left or right of fixation, of a rectangular matrix of 12 cells. On each trial three cells were filled, each with a different symbol drawn from a set of 12 letters and digits. In one (the “letter” experiment) subjects had to decide whether a particular letter (nominated at the end of the trial) had been one of the three presented. In a second (the “position” experiment) they had to decide whether a cell in the matrix (again nominated at the end of the trial) had been one of those that contained a symbol. Judgments were made on a four-point rating scale, and measures of sensitivity and response bias were calculated. In the letter experiment sensitivity was greater for presentations to right of fixation, and in the position experiment for those to left.
TL;DR: These findings contradict previous claims that categorical perception and selective adaptation are manifestations of psychological processes unique to speech perception and may occur in input systems prior to the detectors themselves.
Abstract: Sawtooth acoustic stimuli of different rise times are identified as coming from a plucked string instrument (pluck) or a bowed one (bow). Like stop consonants, these sounds are perceived categorically–-discrimination is poor for stimuli identified as belonging to a single class but good for those identified as members of different classes. Varying the interval between two successive musiclike stimuli hardly alters discrimination. Sawtooth stimuli lasting 750 ms are clearly perceived categorically; those lasting 250 ms are not. Prolonged exposure to a pluck or bow stimulus can shift the rise-time boundary between categories. Shifts due to such selective adaptation decrease as adapting and test stimuli share fewer characteristics. Adaptation of postulated “feature detectors” therefore may occur in input systems prior to the detectors themselves. Our findings contradict previous claims that categorical perception and selective adaptation are manifestations of psychological processes unique to speech perception.
TL;DR: The results are interpreted as indicating that units sensitive to brightness contrast can interfere with those that are sensitive to colour, and it seems necessary to modify or re-evaluate the fatigue theory of negative after-effects.
Abstract: When colour-contingent motion after-effects (MAEs) are induced with spirals that contain both colour and brightness contrast, the MAE is not apparent immediately after adaptation but does appear on a delayed test. However, when induced with stimuli that contain only colour contrast, the colour-contingent MAE is apparent immediately and decreases on a delayed test. The results are interpreted as indicating that units sensitive to brightness contrast can interfere with those that are sensitive to colour. It also seems necessary to modify or re-evaluate the fatigue theory of negative after-effects.
TL;DR: It was concluded that mirror-image confusion at the level of memory is almost certainly a consequence of reversed coding, in some form, in the opposite sides of the brain.
Abstract: Many species have difficulty in discriminating between mirror-image stimuli, especially those about a vertical axis, and when identificatory rather than purely perceptual processes are involved. Various theories are reviewed. In two experiments involving same-different judgments for pairs of stimuli, triangles or semicircles, these were simultaneously presented either unilaterally or bilaterally, and in mirror or aligned orientations with respect to each other. Mirror oriented stimuli presented to opposite cerebral hemispheres were no more readily matched than those possessing the same orientations (aligned), thus suggesting that at the perceptual level there is no interaction between mirror-corresponding points in the two visual cortices. Foreknowledge of stimulus orientations failed differentially to affect the findings. Two other studies were performed involving manual identification of single letters, correct or mirror oriented, in either visual field. Here, for most subjects, mirror reversal proved e...
TL;DR: The data suggest that the observers can make use of the statistical properties of the stimulus sources and are compared with those in recent experiments using pure tones in a discrete trial paradigm and in experiments using semantic stimuli.
Abstract: Listeners were required to detect increments of intensity or frequency in trains of pure tone bursts under different conditions of attention. The data were analysed taking into account contralatera...
TL;DR: Initial increases in the availability of items for report following tachistoscopic presentation of centrally-fixated rows of seven random letters were directly evaluated, and the pattern of results provides support for certain components of several different previous proposals concerning the order in which individual items from multi-element displays become available for report.
Abstract: Initial increases in the availability of items for report following tachistoscopic presentation of centrally-fixated rows of seven random letters were directly evaluated by measuring report accuracy following exposure durations of 10, 20, 40, 80 and 160 ms. A partial-report technique was used, and each presentation of a letter row was immediately followed by the presentation of a masking stimulus. Each of 10 subjects received 840 trials which reflected 24 trials for each exposure-duration by position-probed combination. The letters at both ends of a row became available for report prior to the centre letters. In addition, report of the left-most letter was consistently better than report of the right-most letter, and report of the centre item at fixation improved at a more rapid rate with increased exposure duration than report of the other centre letters. This pattern of results provides support for certain components of several different previous proposals concerning the order in which individual items ...
TL;DR: Deaf and hearing children matched on forward letter span were tested for the backward recall of six item letter series, and the hypothesis that the deaf might have an advantage in backward recall was confirmed for order but not for item errors.
Abstract: Previous work showed that deaf children probably used visual codes for the short-term storage of verbal material. Such a visual code might lack the unidirectional character of a linguistic one. If so, reversed recall of visually presented material might be easier for subjects using visual images, and the deaf might therefore have an advantage in backward recall. Deaf and hearing children matched on forward letter span were tested for the backward recall of six item letter series, and the hypothesis was confirmed for order but not for item errors.
TL;DR: If the type of channel sharing which Broadbent (1958) hypothesized for low information messages also occurs with high information verbal messages, then his filter model is an adequate model of the selective attention process.
Abstract: If the type of channel sharing which Broadbent (1958) hypothesized for low information messages also occurs with high information verbal messages, then his filter model is an adequate model of the ...
TL;DR: A partial report procedure and a backward masking paradigm were employed to explore lateral asymmetries in components of letter recognition, and visual field differences in the effect of a delayed backward mask indicated an RVF superiority in the rate of read-out or encoding.
Abstract: A partial report procedure and a backward masking paradigm were employed to explore lateral asymmetries in components of letter recognition. Stimulus displays were displaced off-centre into the left visual field (LVF) or the right visual field (RVF). Visual field differences in the effect of a delayed backward mask indicated an RVF superiority in the rate of read-out or encoding. Comparison of masked and unmasked full report also yielded estimates of iconic persistence. The persistence of these peripheral displays was surprisingly brief, although it was significantly longer in the LVF (57 ms) than in the RVF (34 ms). Precueing by colour and by location produced a larger partial report advantage in the RVF, reflecting a superiority in selective sampling. With postcueing no partial report effect was obtained at any delay, and this failure was attributed to the briefness of the iconic persistence.
TL;DR: It was concluded that selection operates on the sensory store and that backward masking can affect the naming of a stimulus representation which is residing in the visual short-term store.
Abstract: A two-stage interpretation of the processes underlying tachistoscopic partial report performance is suggested. It is assumed that partial report is mediated by two kinds of visual store (a sensory store and a short-term store) and by two processing operations (selection and naming). In Experiment I, the accuracy and latency of two types of partial report (report by location and report by colour) were compared for cue stimulus-test stimulus intervals ranging from –-500 ms to + 500 ms. It was concluded that selection by colour takes longer than selection by location; an explanation in terms of differential decay of attributes in the sensory store was rejected. In Experiment II, cue stimulus delays of 0, 150 and 300 ms were employed, and a backward masking stimulus followed the cue stimulus with a delay of 200, 300, 400 or 600 ms. The amount of masking depended on the cue stimulus-masking stimulus interval, rather than on the test stimulus-masking stimulus interval. It was concluded that selection operates o...
TL;DR: It was concluded that a verbal label functions mainly to direct attention to specific facial features during viewing, and the effect of the label on recognition is positive or negative depending on whether or not it directs attention to features which are functional for the recognition test.
Abstract: Four experiments investigated the effects of labelling on the encoding and recognition of schematic faces. In Experiments I and II, hard-to-label (H) faces were recognized better after labelling than after observing, whereas easy-to-label (E) faces were not significantly affected. However, E faces were recognized better after labelling when subjects were instructed to attend carefully to all features of the faces during viewing. In Experiments III and IV, which dealt with each kind of face separately, both E and H faces were recognized better after labelling than after observing. An additional improvement in recognition all of faces was found when labelling subjects knew which label was relevant on each recognition trial and were instructed to use it. It was concluded that (a) a verbal label functions mainly to direct attention to specific facial features during viewing, (b)the effect of the label on recognition is positive or negative depending on whether or not it directs attention to features which are...
TL;DR: Recording cues were provided which were expected to eliminate retrograde amnesia but worsen or have no effect on anterograde amnesia to provide recall cues which indicated that in the double cue condition retrogradeAmnesia disappeared and anterOGradeAmnesia became larger.
Abstract: The present experiment tested the hypothesis that retrograde induced amnesia is due to retrieval failure and anterograde induced amnesia to encoding failure by providing recall cues which were expected to eliminate retrograde amnesia but worsen or have no effect on anterograde amnesia. The 80 subjects received auditory presentation of 10 lists, each composed of 15 four-letter words presented at a rate of 2s/item at 75 dB in a free-recall task, followed by a 72 s recall period. The amnesia-producing event was an outstanding item in serial position 8 presented at 115 dB (about the intensity of a loud shout) on half the lists. During the first half of the recall period subjects free-recalled, but during the last half they were given a list of the first (single cue) or the first two (double cue) letters of each word, to be used as aids to recall. To demonstrate induced amnesia, lists containing a loud item were compared to those not containing one. First half free recall performance indicated that large retro...
TL;DR: It is argued that this failure of adequate trace formation results from the failure to “describe” the spatial relations which characterize a figure and that such a process of description constitutes the essence of form perception and does not occur without attention.
Abstract: Methods were devised which made it possible for subjects to look directly at novel forms without attending to them. In one method a state of inattention was achieved without the use of distracting or competing material whereas in a second method the subjects selectively attended to one series of moving figures rather than another simultaneously presented series. While recognition of form directly afterward was excellent even under incidental conditions with attention it was poor or at a chance level without attention. The results suggest that without attention memory of the specific shape of a figure is not established although there is memory for certain other general characteristics of the figure. It is argued that this failure of adequate trace formation results from the failure to “describe” the spatial relations which characterize a figure. It is suggested that such a process of description constitutes the essence of form perception and does not occur without attention.
TL;DR: The authors found that children aged 16 years showed poorer incidental learning for nouns if the orienting task was one of finding rhymes for the items compared to assigning each word to a semantic category.
Abstract: Schoolchildren, aged 16 years showed poorer incidental learning for nouns if the orienting task was one of finding rhymes for the items compared to assigning each word to a semantic category. On a recognition task including homophone and synonym foils, rhyming subjects made significantly more phonemic errors, whereas categorizing subjects produced a significantly greater number of semantic confusions. Subjects instructed to construct images for each of the nouns showed a performance pattern similar to the categorizing group. The results are interpreted in terms of Herriot's (1974) view that different levels of processing are associated with the coding of different clusters of stimulus attributes.
TL;DR: The results suggest that the qualities of a visual image are retained all the way from image acquisition to retrieval, and that the visual components of images generated at the acquisition stage are probably not lost by subsequent coding processes.
Abstract: Twenty-six subjects memorized lists of (low I and high I) noun pairs under imagery or verbal mediation instructions. At recall the subjects were presented a digit (“1” or “2”) either auditorily or visually as an interfering stimulus. Visual interference was found to selectively affect the retrieval of high I response terms. Also, the retrieval of nouns studied by imagery mediation was found to be selectively disrupted by visual interference. These results suggest that the qualities of a visual image are retained all the way from image acquisition to retrieval, and that the visual components of images generated at the acquisition stage are probably not lost by subsequent coding processes.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors reviewed and modified the criteria proposed by Broadbent (1971) for deciding between "all-or-none" and "shared" models of divided attention and concluded that the shared model has the widest application to these results and similar findings reported elsewhere.
Abstract: Criteria proposed by Broadbent (1971) for deciding between “all-or-none” and “shared” models of divided attention are reviewed and modified Of the modified criteria, the amount of the reduction in efficiency and the shape of the normalized ROC curve are identified as being diagnostic for deciding between the two models When applied to the results of two experiments involving the recognition of difficult nonverbal signals, which showed performance on the signals presented together to be significantly worse than performance on the signals when presented alone, both the criteria favour the shared model rather than the all-or-none model The results of a third experiment with easy signals indicated that artefacts unrelated to attention were unable to account for the reduction in efficiency with difficult signals It is concluded that the shared model, which assumes some limit to processing capacity, has the widest application to these results and similar findings reported elsewhere The role of the all-or-n
TL;DR: In this paper, an experiment was performed to determine the effects of negation in the major premise and/or conclusion of exclusive disjunction arguments on adults' abilities to apply two basic principles of disjunctive argumentation, and the results indicated that arguments involving the confirmation of one of the components of the disjctive premise followed by the denial of the other component of this premise were easier to evaluate than those in which this confirmation/denial sequence was reversed.
Abstract: An experiment was performed to determine the effects of negation in the major premise and/or conclusion of exclusive disjunction arguments on adults' abilities to apply two basic principles of exclusive disjunction. The component of the disjunctive premise that was referred to in the minor premise was varied systematically so that the influence of this factor could also be explored. The results indicated that arguments involving the confirmation of one of the components of the disjunctive premise followed by the denial of the other component of this premise were easier to evaluate than those in which this confirmation/denial sequence was reversed. In addition, arguments in which the disjunctive premise had two affirmative components were easier than those in which the disjunctive premise contained at least one negative component, but arguments with affirmative conclusions were more difficult than those with negative conclusions. Most importantly, an examination of subjects' errors and their response patte...
TL;DR: The readiness with which different stimuli disappear when viewed as stabilized images is compared with their behaviour in binocular and monocular rivalry; the results normally associated with stabilized images are reproduced in these non-stabilized conditions.
Abstract: The readiness with which different stimuli disappear when viewed as stabilized images is compared with their behaviour in binocular and monocular rivalry. The results normally associated with stabilized images are reproduced in these non-stabilized conditions. In the context of monocular rivalry, where a red figure that is superimposed on a green field readily disappears, two additional observations are made. First, the nature of the field boundary within which images are viewed, influences their readiness to disappear. Angular figures disappear more or less readily than curved figures, depending whether the field boundary is circular or square. Second, the movement masking phenomenon, previously observed in binocular rivalry and stabilized imagery, is reproduced in monocular rivalry. Division of Psychology, Preston Polytechnic, Preston PR1 7DP.
TL;DR: This paper grouped models of divided attention into two classes according to whether they assume that efficiency on one task is independent of or interacts with the level of difficulty on a second task, i.e., the efficiency of one task depends on the difficulty of the other task.
Abstract: Models of divided attention are grouped into two classes according to whether they assume that efficiency on one task is independent of or interacts with the level of difficulty on a second simulta...
TL;DR: In this article, bigram frequency counts are given for the first letter-pairs, last letter-pair, and other letterpairs of words of more than three letters.
Abstract: In the first part of this paper bigram frequency counts are given for the first letter-pairs, last letter-pairs and “other” letter-pairs of words of more than three letters. A short discussion of t...