The rôle of practice in speed of association.

Abstract

Proficiency in a given performance is usually measured in terms of the speed and effectiveness with which the task is executed. The results of experiments on learning and practice would seem to indicate that such proficiency is influenced by four factors, each of which may vary independently: (i) the ease with which the individual motor adjustments are carried into effect, (2) the ease with which the elements calling for adjustment are discriminated, (3) the ease with which the recognized sensory elements lead over into appropriate reactions, that is, the facility of the associative and coordinating processes, and (4) the ease with which the shift between consecutive adjustments is made. In other words, the typical adjustmental situation calls for motor adjustment, sensory discrimination, association and shift.The factors mentioned pertain only to the perfection of necessary adjustments, while differences in proficiency have long been recognized to depend upon still another factor, the presence or absence of unnecessary reactions. In skilled performances there are always a certain number of 'random reactions' which tend to be eliminated with increased practise. This is true even in the simplest tasks where the reactions to be made are closely defined and well known to the subject. But while the importance of this factor is fairly obvious and has been duly recognized in practise and learning experiments, the same cannot be said of the other four factors, the significance of which is much more difficult to determine experimentally.

A reversal of the Stroop interference effect, through scanning:

“…First, W scanning times were longer than C times (Fs from 79 to 155, ps < .001, within each cell), confirming Lund's (1927) finding (see Fig. I).…”

“…Most investigators favor a differential practice explanation [see Jensen & Rohwer's (1966) comprehensive review of the Stroop literature ]. Lund (1927, cited by Jensen & Rohwer, 1966 found that scanning times for colors are shorter than for words. Thus, if Ss scan for red on C, they should do this faster than scanning for RED on W. This is a reversal of the usual relation between times on C and W, when Ss name or read each instance.…”

Motor and verbal reaction times to words and drawings

“…Cattell, it is known that the time for naming (verbal reaction time) an object (or a color, a geometric figure, a drawing) is longer than the time for reading the name of that object. This result has been conflfmed by Lund (1927), Ligon (1932), Fraisse (1964), but the explanation of this phenomenon is still disputed.…”

“…Cattell, it is known that the time for naming (verbal reaction time) an object (or a color, a geometric figure, a drawing) is longer than the time for reading the name of that object. This result has been conflfmed by Lund (1927), Ligon (1932), Fraisse (1964, but the explanation of this phenomenon is still disputed.In attempting to explain the difference between the time for naming an object (object-naming) and the time for reading the corresponding name (word-reading), Brown (1915), Ligon (1932), Fraisse (1964) have studied the role of practice. However, it is to be noted that practice reduces but does not suppress the difference.…”

The effects of stress on Stroop color-word performance

“…, observing that it takes more time to name colors than to read color llames (Brown, 1915;Lund, 1927;Ligon, 1932), proposed a technique for investigating the interfering effect of the presence of conflicting word stimuli upon naming colors (e.g., the word "blue" is printed on the color red, the task being to name the color of the ink and ignore the word). The series of tasks has proved discriminative in studies attempting to elaborate cognitive styles (Broverman & Lazarus, 1958;Broverman, 1960), in studies comparing groups which are ordered developmentally (Comalli, Wapner, & Werner, 1962;Schiller, 1966), and in Ss under primitivizing drugs vs placebo conditions (Wapner & Krus, 1960).…”