Louis G. Lippman

Fixed interval performance as related to instructions and to subjects’ verbalizations of the contingency

Sixteen female Ss earned a total of 50 reinforcements on a FI 20 sec reinforcement schedule. The reinforcers used were points on a counter. The Ss were instructed that the reinforcement contingency involved either the number of responses, or an interval of time, or Ss were given no information about the schedule. The Ss’ performance was related not only to instructions, but also to Ss’ verbalizations of the reinforcement contingency.

Fixed Interval Performance as Related to Subjects’ Verbalizations of the Reinforcement Contingency

Abstract80 female Ss earned points on a counter for button pressing on a FI 20, 40, 60 and 80 sec. schedule of reinforcement. The Ss were uninformed of the reinforcement schedule. The Ss’ final performance and verbalization of the reinforcement contingency were related to initial rate of responding and presence of a shift in rate during training, but unrelated to interval duration.

Group predictions of item differences of CVC trigrams

Two groups of Ss ranked 20 CVC trigrams, which represented the full range of meaningfulness values according to established norms, for either pronunciability or ease of learning, and then recalled the trigrams incidentally. Two additional groups learned the trigrams by free learning and then ranked the trigrams for either pronunciability or ease of learning. Correlations between mean ranks, group learning measures, and meaningfulness were fairly high (median r =.75), in keeping with recently reported findings.

The effect of age and postweaning and adult handling habituation on activity and exploration in the rat

Activity and exploratory behavior in rats was examined on 2 consecutive days of testing at 35 and again at 90 days of age using Greek cross mazes, proportional in size to the subject, having black, white, striped, and checkered arms. Half of the young animals received handling habituation prior to testing and half of each of these groups were handled prior to testing in adulthood. Young rats were more active than adults and handling, either postweaning or in adulthood, increased activity and exploratory behavior. Results also indicated that early handling potentiates the effects of later handling.

Reconstruction of Spatial or Temporal Sequence

Summary Two experiments were designed to test the hypotheses based on a discrimination learning interpretation of serial learning that (a) performance would be superior when items were presented spatially (simultaneous exposure) rather than temporally (successive presentation), and (b) the relative superiority of spatial over temporal presentation would be greatest for high similarity material. In the first experiment, 64 adult Ss learned a 10-item list of CVC trigrams; in the second experiment, 72 Ss learned a nine-item series of consonant bigrams. Total correct placements per trial, total per serial position, and percentages per position were subjected to ANOVAs with ps ≪ .05. Although total correct was not significantly affected by the spatialtemporal variable, spatial presentation tended to reduce the magnitude of position effects, resulting in a somewhat flattened curve. Contrary to expectation this effect tended to be greater when similarity was low and when material was simple (bigrams). Interpreta...

Serial Isolation Effect as a Function of Instructions and Stimulus Intensity

Serial Isolation Effect as a Function of Instructions and Stimulus Intensity Keith D. Turner & Louis G. Lippman To cite this article: Keith D. Turner & Louis G. Lippman (1971) Serial Isolation Effect as a Function of Instructions and Stimulus Intensity, The Journal of General Psychology, 85:1, 107-114, DOI: 10.1080/00221309.1971.9920659 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00221309.1971.9920659

Symbolic and size shifts in short-term memory tasks

Five groups of 30 Ss were tested for recall of triads of spelled-out numbers (SON) or arabic numerals (AN) for four trials in order to examine the effects of a shift in either symbolic presentation or physical size. Recall was facilitated by size and symbolic changes. overall recall of AN was superior to that of SON. and idios-v-ncratic item effects were observed. The relationship between these results and isolation effects was discussed.

Effects of shifts in visual, semantic, and acoustic-semantic stimulus attributes in STM tasks

Four groups of 20 Ss recalled triads of spelled-out numbers for three trials. The type of material presented on the fourth trial was the same for the control (C) group but differed either visually (V), semantically (S), or acoustically and semantically (AS) from prior material for three experimental groups. Recall for all groups decreased over the first three trials. Vocal and written recall on the fourth trial for Groups V and SA, but only vocal recall of Group S, was superior to that of Group C. In contrast to the recent emphasis upon acoustic storage, the present results indicate that short-term memory of verbal material entails both an auditory and visual process. The results were discussed in terms of extensions of the interference-encoding hypothesis.

Pinnae movement as related to auditory intensity in gerbils

Pinnae movement in response to the onset of a 1500-Hz tone was examined over a 50-dB range of intensity in five gerbils. The quality and frequency of these responses was found to relate directly to intensity. The protective function of these responses was discussed.

Cue utilization in serial learning

Four experimental groups (N = 24 each) in which the intertriai interval (ITI) was shifted to the middle of the 12-item list after S attained at least 1, 4, 7, or 10 correct anticipations on a single trial (Groups E1, E4, E7, and E10, respectively) were compared to a control group (N = 24) in which the ITI maintained a constant location. The results showed no significant impairment in performance for Groups E4 and E7 a temporary decrement for E10, and a more extended decrement for Group E1, supporting predictions based upon the extent to which S is dependent upon the ITI for maintenance of the cue value of the first item and the extent to which S has acquired a set regarding the location of the ITI within the series. It was suggested that interference effects were minimized in the present experiment due to the visual identity of the ITI to the inter-item space.