Determining the developmental requirements for hebb repetition learning in young children: Grouping, short-term memory, and their interaction.

Abstract

The Hebb repetition paradigm has recently attracted attention as a measure of serial order learning, which underlies word-form learning abilities. Although children are good vocabulary learners, it is surprising that previous Hebb learning studies with young children show rather weak Hebb effects. In this study, we conducted two experiments to identify developmental factors that drive an increase of the size of the Hebb effect in young children. Motivated by evidence from adult work, we focused on an ability to group a sequence into consistent subsequences and on phonological short-term memory (STM) capacity. In Experiment 1 ( = 98), it was shown that 3- to 5-year-old children with high phonological STM capacity showed a Hebb effect, particularly in the later experimental trials. In Experiment 2 ( = 97), temporal grouping of the sequences in 2-2 subsequences further encouraged children with high phonological STM capacity to show the Hebb effect even in the earlier experimental trials and children with low STM capacity to show a trend toward a Hebb effect in the later trials. Moreover, across Experiments 1 and 2 we found robust evidence of transfer of the Hebb effect to recall of new sequences that partially overlapped in item-by-item pairings with the Hebb sequence, indicating that children use consistent grouping strategies when learning above-span Hebb sequences. These findings indicate that phonological STM, grouping consistency, and their interaction are developmental requirements for the Hebb effect to emerge. (PsycINFO Database Record

Verbal Working Memory, Long-Term Knowledge, and Statistical Learning

“…It is assumed that for adult participants, any types of verbal sequences (even of syllables or letters) might contain somehow previously experienced pairs of items that potentially interfere with or diminish learning of experimentally provided item sequences. This assumption is consistent with the finding that young children, who have less exposure to a language environment than adults, are sensitive to statistical structure as much as whole-sequence repetition (Yanaoka, Nakayama, Jarrold, & Saito, 2019).…”

The articulatory determinants of verbal sequence learning.

“…Long-term verbal sequence learning is indicated by the enhanced serial recall of the repeating sequence compared to the filler sequences. There is now good evidence that the Hebb repetition effect constitutes a laboratory analog of natural word-form learning (e.g., Mosse & Jarrold, 2008; Szmalec, Duyck, Vandierendonck, Mata, & Page, 2009, 2012; Yanaoka, Nakayama, Jarrold, & Saito, 2019). Indeed, given the great value of the Hebb effect for investigating the relation between short- and long-term serial memory, both in and outside the language domain (e.g., Couture & Tremblay, 2006), it has recently been identified as a “benchmark of high priority” for theories of short-term and working memory (Oberauer et al, 2018).…”