Concept identification as a function of irrelevant information and instructions.

Archer, E. James; Bourne, Lyle E.; Brown, Frederick G.

doi:10.1037/h0048112

Cited by 100 publications

(57 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…Subsequent testing (Tukey test, Type B) showed that all three levels of complexity were significantly different from each other at p < .01. This effect follows the generally found trends of stimulus complexity (Archer, Bourne, & Brown, 1955;Pishkin, 1960). The cue availability main effect was also significant (F :: 7.84, df:: 2/144, p< .01), with the error rate being reliably reduced by the introduction of the memory aid (x :: 2.28) at the .01 level (Tukey test, Type B).…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 48%

Attention and memory cues in concept learning as a function of task complexity and age

Pishkin

Rasmussen

1974

Memory & Cognition

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The effects of attention and memory cues on concept learning performance were investigated as a function of task complexity and grade level of Ss. It was found that: (1) the attention and rnemory cues were closely interrelated in their effects upon performance with both significantly improving performance at all but the lowest levels of complexity; (2) both types of cues considerably lessened the effect of stimulus cornplexity upon performance; and (3) the attention cue elicited the best performance from Ss in the first through ninth grades, while the memory cue elicited the best performance from 4-year-old and kindergarten Ss.Attention and memory have been stressed as processes underlying some of the basic changes which occur within cognitive development. The importance of attentional factors in children's learning is pointed out by recent studies of Zeaman and House (1963), Suchman and Trabasso (1966), and also by work with the orienting response (Sokolov, 1963;Zaporozhets, 1960). The role of memory functions in cognitive growth is stressed by Bruner (1964) with his considerations of changing operational memory systems within the child and by Wohlwill (1962) who emphasizes decreasing dependence on information within the immediate stimulus field as a function of age. A major purpose of the present study was to explore the influence of attention and memory cues on cognitive performance with Ss from preschool through junior high school age.In concept identification research, specific experimental manipulations have been operationally linked with the processes of attention and memory. Techniques to establish cue or dimensional preferences through pretesting, pretraining, or the use of emphasizers within the task have been connected with attentional requirements of conceptual tasks. These manipulations have been found to both improve and hinder performance, depending on whether the emphasis has been placed on the saliency of the relevant or the irrelevant dimensions of the task (Rasmussen & Archer, 1961;Archer, 1962;Trabasso, 1963; Suchman & T rabasso, 1966;Stephens, 1968). Past stimulus availability has been associated with the memory requirements of concept identification tasks and has been found to improve performance for fourth-grade through college Ss (Cahill & Hovland, 1960;Bourne, Goldstein, & Link, 1964;Pishkin & Wolfgang, 1965;Pishkin, Wolfgang, & Rasmussen, 1967).These manipulations associated with attention and memory processes have generally been studied *Thanks are given to the staffand students of Casady School, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, for their cooperation and participation.separately. In order to obtain a clearer picture of the effects of these manipulations upon performance, they were compared over severallevels of task complexity as well as with several age groups in the present study.The attention and memory cues used in this experiment followed manipulations that have been utilized in other concept learning experiments. The memory aid used was the presence of a specific past correct instance ...

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 48%

Attention and memory cues in concept learning as a function of task complexity and age

Pishkin

Rasmussen

1974

Memory & Cognition

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“…54, 19.23, 24.78, and 36.19. An orthogonal polynomial (Archer, Bourne, & Brown, 1955;Bourne, 1957;Pishkin, 1960). …”

Section: Irrelevant Dimensionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Auditory Dimensions and Irrelevant Information in Concept Identification of Males and Females

Pishkin

Shurley

1965

Percept Mot Skills

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Auditory concept identification ( C I ) of males and females was studied under 4 degrees of complexity and 3 types of dimensions as sources of relevant information, CI was negatively influenced by complexity, and females performed better than males when lateraliry of C1 signal was relevant. Interactions between dimensions were found; explanation of sex differences in CI was attempted.Theoretical parameters for prediction of concept identification ( C I ) performance have been developed on the basis of relevant and irrelevant visual cues (Bourne & Restle, 1959). Traditionally, information is presented to S in CI experiments by visual means, while efforts to measure the function of auditory dimension in CI have been few. More recently, Bo~irne and Restle's (1959) approach was extended to introduce a social cue parameter, based on auditory information from another subject (XI), in a CI situation (Pishkin & Blanchard, 1963); thus, auditory information was introduced within CI framework, although, in that smdy, the content of Sl's cues rather than the sense modaliry was the main independent variable. The S1 information had significant infl~ience when it was introdi~ced along with traditional CI information; here, the S1 cues were both auditory and social and there was no assessment of purely a~lditory information. In another investigation with mixed sex populations, a combination of visual and auditory modalities was utilized by Lordahl (1961), who studied the effects of simultaneous presentation of auditory and visual signals in relation to the relevancy of the two types of cues; he reported that Ss responded primarily on the basis of visual cues and that irrelevant auditory information had no significant effect on performance. In a subsequent experiment, Bulgarella and Archer (1962) varied relevant and irrelevant a~tditory information only with female Ss from introductory and intermediate courses in psychology and fo~ind linear degradation in performance as a function of irrelevant information. Pishkin and Blanchard (1964) also demonstrated greater task difficulty with increase of irrelevant auditory information with older, male and female Ss, b u t in addition, there was a tendency for sex groups to differ in their performance under conditions of no irrelevant information when laterality and amplitude were relevant dimensions.'This project was suported by Veterans Administration Medical Research funds (8200). 'The authors wish to thank Lewis M. Jones and Aaron Wolfgang for their valuable assistance.

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“…Thus, Archer (1954) fo~d that response time in a concept formation task increased as a linear function of the amount of relevant information, but was independent of the level of irrelevancy. Archer, Bourne, and Brown (1955) found that as irrelevant elements were increased, efficiency of categorizing unusual patterns decreased even when ,2swere instructed how to test for irrelevancy.…”

Section: The Effegr Of Three Types Of Visual Irrelevancy On 1 Complexmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effect of Three Types of Visual Irrelevancy on Complex Decision Making1

Landis

Slivka²,

Silver

1969

ETS Research Bulletin Series

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The present study investigated the effects of visual information irrelevancy on complex decision. making. Three types of irrelevancy were defined (clutter, r1oninf'ormative irrelevancy and coding redundancy) and incorporated as independent variables in the research. Thirty male college §.S solved a set of static problems involving decision making with a known pay-off, but where the output would be difficult for .2 to accurately estimate. Results indicated that, under the conditions of this study, irrelevancy is facilitative for decision making and the more random the irrelevancy, the more adequate the solution. These findings ape discussed within the framework of a theory that postulates that irrelevancy aids in the figure-ground articulation of the cognitive field. THE EFFEGr OF THREE TYPES OF VISUAL IRRELEVANCY ON 1 COMPLEX DECISION MAKINGThe term irrelevant information in the psychological literature re~ers to two quite separate sets of experimental manipulations. On the one hand, it has been used to refer to an asynchrony between training and criterion trials in concept identification tasks. Thus, 2 is trained on one stimulus dimension and later tested in a concept identification situation wherein the training dimension cannot be used to attain correct categorization.The other usage of the term derives from the use of additional stimuli in search-time discrimination tasks. In this type of task, S has to identify critical stimuli in a "noisy" field. These studies have derived their impetus from the problems faced by a radar operator on extended watches.The results of almost all of the studies investigating the effects of irrelevancy as a training variable have suggested that the inclusion of such a variable at best does not affect performance. Thus, Archer (1954) fo~d that response time in a concept formation task increased as a linear function of the amount of relevant information, but was independent of the level of irrelevancy. Archer, Bourne, and Brown (1955) found that as irrelevant elements were increased, efficiency of categorizing unusual patterns decreased even when ,2swere instructed how to test for irrelevancy.Henneman (1957) and Morin, Forrin, and Archer (1961) verified Archer's (1954) study that irrelevancy does not significantly degrade performance. In addition, Henneman (1957) found that making information sometimes irrelevant and sometimes relevant will degrade performance. Detambel and Stolurow (1956) showed that lowering the conspicuity of irrelevant infornation interferes with the learning process. Namikas (1968) also found that training on a relevant dimension improved performance in the concept -2-formation transfer task. Interestingly enough, however, groups that were trained on irrelevant dimensions were not significantly different from those trained on neutral dimensions or those receiving no training. Katz (1968) applied the concept learning paradigm to the developmental effect of irrelevant dimensions. She found that while a degradation occurred in adults as a fu...

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Concept identification as a function of irrelevant information and instructions.

Cited by 100 publications

References 19 publications

Attention and memory cues in concept learning as a function of task complexity and age

Attention and memory cues in concept learning as a function of task complexity and age

Auditory Dimensions and Irrelevant Information in Concept Identification of Males and Females

The Effect of Three Types of Visual Irrelevancy on Complex Decision Making1

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