Forgetting in retarded and nonretarded persons under conditions of minimal strategy use

Short-term memory processes of mentally retarded (mild, moderate, and severe) and nonretarded persons were compared in a delayed matching-to-sample task that minimized the use of verbal rehearsal. In addition to trials with delays up to 20 s, the inclusion of trials on which the sample and comparison stimuli occurred simultaneously made it possible to isolate memory and discriminability. Forgetting was most pronounced between the simultaneous and 0-s conditions, and nonretarded subjects forgot less than retarded subjects between these conditions. There were no group differences beyond the 0-s delay. Ease of strategy use failed to account for individual differences, and reported strategy use was not related systematically to performance. These findings are incompatible with the hypothesis that normal-retarded differences occur only on tasks involving effortful cognitive strategies. Differences between nonretarded and retarded groups in this study may be due to a failure in automatic encoding processes in retarded persons.     

Task instructions and strategy transfer in the directed forgetting performance of mentally retarded adolescents

The influence of task explanation on strategy transfer was studied in educable mentally retarded adolescents (13 to 15 years old). A directed forgetting task was used in which the person was required to recall short sequences of picture names. In some sequences there was a cue to forget the first few pictures (irrelevant information) and to remember only the subsequent pictures (relevant information). During the first session the amount of explanation given the directed forgetting task was varied, and during the second, some of the subjects were trained to rehearse in a simple sequential memory task. Transfer of training was then examined on a retest of the directed forgetting task. The majority of subjects trained to rehearse and given a minimal explanation of the directed forgetting task maintained the strategy on trials which were identical to those used during rehearsal training, but failed to generalize the strategy on other trials. The results indicate that providing a full explanation of the task requirements does not assure strategy generalization, but providing only a minimal explanation makes strategy generalization unlikely.     

Differences in intelligence and automatic memory processes

Intelligence-related differences in memory have been viewed as dependent upon control rather than structural memory processes. A test of this notion was made by comparing retarded and nonretarded persons on a subject-paced continuous recognition memory task which was judged to be nonstrategic. The stimuli were computer-generated faces and words. Analyses of pacing rates and posttest interviews provided no consistent evidence for strategy use. Differences in memory between the retarded and nonretarded subjects were attributed to differences in automatic aspects of encoding.     

Two developmental transitions in selective remembering strategies

Two experiments were reported investigating developmental changes in the use of strategies to eliminate interference from irrelevant information in memory. The participants in the first were 7-, 9-, and 11-year-old children and those in the second were adults. In both experiments a directed forgetting paradigm was used in which the person was presented two sets of pictures but only recalled one set on a trial. On some trials there was a cue to forget the first set and to remember only the second set. There were two developmental transitions. The first was from ineffective to effective selective remembering which occurred between 7 and 11 years of age. The second, which occurred between 11 years of age and adulthood, was from the use of selective retrieval strategy to a more sophisticated rehearsal strategy. The implications of these two developmental transitions were discussed.     

Response deprivation and instrumental performance in the controlled-amount paradigm

The response deprivation analysis, previously applied to a paradigm frequently used in free operant experiments, was applied successfully to another paradigm frequently used in discrete trials experiments. Each trial ended when the rat performed 1 lick at an empty tube (E), and either 10 or 100 licks at a second tube containing either saccharin (S) or water (W). Baseline trials were begun by exposing both tubes. Contigency trials required 1 instrumental E-lick for access to the second tube. Rate of instrumental responding, relative to baseline, was directly proportional to the value required if the subject were to perform the contingent licks at their baseline rates. The results also confirmed the predicted functional relations between the absolute rate of instrumental responding and the number of contingent S-licks, the number of contingent W-licks, and hours of water deprivation. Critical implications for the concept of instrumental reinforcement were discussed.     

The sufficient conditions for directed forgetting in normal and educable mentally retarded adolescents

A series of studies investigated the conditions under which normal and educable mentally retarded adolescents (13 to 15 years old) would or would not disregard irrelevant information in memory. A directed forgetting task was used in which the person was required to recall short sequences of picture names. In some sequences there was a cue to forget the first few pictures (irrelevant information) and to remember only the subsequent pictures (relevant information). When normal adolescents were given no explanation of the forget cue, there was interference from the irrelevant information. A minimum explanation of the cue, however, was sufficient to eliminate interference for the normal adolescents. The same minimal explanation was not sufficient for mentally retarded adolescents. It was clear that irrelevant information in memory interfered with the performance of retarded adolescents given only a minimal explanation of the forget cue. These results are important since most naturalistic situations do not involve an elaborate explanation of the importance of disregarding irrelevant information previously stored in memory.     

The role of vivid information in fear appeals and attitude change

Fear-arousing persuasive communications frequently incorporate so many types of information that the results can be difficult to interpret. R. Nisbett and L. Ross' (1980, Human inference: Strategies and shortcomings of social judgment, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall) analysis of informational vividness offers an attractive conceptual framework that identifies and predicts the effects of several types of information that have been confounded with other variables in fear appeal studies. Thus, the first purpose of this factorial experiment was to investigate the persuasive impact of three types of vivid information frequently used in fear appeals: emotional interest, concreteness, and proximity. It was predicted that vivid information would be more persuasive than pallid information. The results disclosed that emotionally interesting information was highly effective in changing intentions to seek protection from the depicted health threat. Also, the impact of information of high emotional interest and greater temporal and spatial proximity was enhanced with the passage of time, but information of low emotional interest and proximity diminished over time. Additional findings indicated that concrete, specific information was memorable and affected beliefs. The data rejected the hypothesis that memorial availability mediated the effects of vivid information. Implications for designing and strengthening fear appeals were discussed.     

Effects of threatening and reassuring components of fear appeals on physiological and verbal measures of emotion and attitudes

Physiological processes are integral components of (a) many conceptualizations of emotion, (b) the emotion of fear, and (c) the fear-as-acquired-drive model of attitude change. Nevertheless, few studies of fear and persuasion have simultaneously measured self-reports of fear and autonomic activity. The present factorial experiment manipulated high versus low fear and high versus low reassurance and monitored self-reports and cardiovascular and electrodermal activity. The results disclosed that heart rate (HR) and skin conductance (SC) were highly correlated (r = .70). Although the multiple correlation among HR, SC, and a self-report measure of fear was a modest .44 (p < .05), additional evidence suggested that self-reports were the most sensitive measure of the construct of fear. The fear-film manipulation, which is typical of many fear-arousing communications, had identical effects upon the autonomic and self-report measures of fear. These data support the construct validity of the self-report measure of fear and increase our confidence that “fear” has been aroused in previous studies of fear and persuasion. Neither the fear-film manipulation nor the autonomic components of fear were associated with attitude change. The reassurance variable facilitated attitude change. Overall, the findings emphasized the importance of cognitive mediational processes rather than an emotional state of fear.     

Instrumental and contingent saccharin licking in rats: Response deprivation and reinforcement

Instrumental licking of .4% saccharin solution was increased by the contingent opportunity to lick a less-preferred saccharin solution when the contingency schedule deprived the subject of the contingent response, but not otherwise. Schedules that imposed comparable amounts of response deprivation produced comparable increases in instrumental responding. The results support the hypothesis that instrumental responding will increase if and only if the contingency schedule deprives the subject of the contingent response. They also support the implication that the predicted increase will occur even if the contingent response has a lower operant level than the instrumental response.     

The effect of deprivation level during noncontingent pairings and instrumental learning on subsequent instrumental performance

In Experiment 1, rats received either response-noncontingent pairings of a tone stimulus with food or response-contingent instrumental training during which only responses in the presence of the tone were reinforced. During this training rats were maintained at either 70 or 90% of their growth-adjusted predeprivation body weights. In a subsequent test phase, one-half of the subjects in each training condition were tested under either 70 or 90% body weight. Subjects which had received response-contingent instrumental training under 70% body weight responded significantly faster to presentations of the tone than did 90% body weight-trained subjects, regardless of test deprivation condition. There was no effect of the deprivation level in effect during response-noncontingent pairings. In Experiment 2, rats received noncontingent tone-reward pairings or nonpairings under either 70 or 90% body weight. In a later test phase under 90% body weight, instrumental responding to the tone was significantly faster for subjects which had received the tone-reward pairings. Deprivation level during the pairings again produced no effect. These results support two conclusions. First, the expectancy learning process appears to be relatively independent of deprivation conditions in effect when such learning takes place; and secondly, deprivation conditions in effect during instrumental learning affect the strength of S-R associative bonds formed.     

The differential reinforcement of reward-produced and response-produced stimuli

In two experiments, groups received successive large-reward trials on odd-numbered days and successive small-reward trials on even-numbered days in the same gray alleyway. This produced a discrimination problem in which the memory of large reward (S^L) was reliably discriminative of large reward and the memory of small reward (S^S) was reliably discriminative of small reward. Intertrial interval (ITI) was varied both between and within groups. In the within-groups manipulation, ITI separating S+ trials differed from that separating S- trials. Experimental groups learned the discrimination, running slower to S^S (S- cue) than to S^L (S+ cue), and showed a negative contrast effect, running slower to S- than a small-reward control group. Discrimination was somewhat faster at massed than at spaced trials. The within-groups manipulation of ITI suggested that the effects of ITI were mediated by time-dependent changes in internal cues produced by reward events and by the instrumental response. The control exercised by internal cues was shown to be associative rather than nonassociative, e.g., motivational. Similarities with, and implications for, conventional brightness differential conditioning were discussed.     

The use of expectancy theory in the explanation of turnover in ROTC

A questionnaire was administered to 142 mate students who were enrolled in ROTC and 18 male students who had dropped out of ROTC. Several months later seven of the above 142 subjects dropped out of ROTC. A ratio expectancy theory model was developed from the questionnaire as an operational definition of motivation to remain in ROTC. The results indicated that the 25 dropouts had a significantly lower (p < .001) score on this motivational measure than the 135 subjects who were still enrolled in ROTC, and also that these latter subjects were as strongly attracted to a civilian job as they were to an Army job. The implications of these findings relative to the ability of the Army to attract career officers were discussed.     

Toward a reconceptualization of the reciprocal imitation phenomenon: Two experiments

This paper reports two experiments which consider the increased imitation exhibited by models who have been imitated. Experiment 1 was concerned with whether the reciprocal imitation effect is really reciprocal or if the subsequent imitation will generalize to someone else. It was found that adult subjects who were previously imitated at the 75% rate on a perceptual judgments task subsequently imitated their partner more, rated their partner more attractive, and felt more confidence when imitated than did subjects imitated at the 25% rate. These results were obtained regardless of which confederate the subjects imitated, thus indicating that reciprocal imitation is not necessarily reciprocal, but is generalizable. Experiment 2 assessed whether the subsequent imitation is the product of the effects of being imitated or is the result of the subject observing the imitator's imitation. The results indicated that after having observed imitation at a 75% rate, adult onlookers are more likely to subsequently imitate and be attracted to the imitator, the imitated person, and a person new to the situation than are onlookers who observed a 25% imitation rate. A theoretical modification is advanced which holds that subsequent imitation effects, whether from observing others imitate or from being the target of the imitation, result from a process of imitation of imitativeness. The results of these two experiments have implications for theory in imitation and social learning.     

Effects of food priming on instrumental acquisition and performance

Four experiments investigated the effects of a priming food reinforcement, given 0 or 75 sec pretrial, on runway performance of rats. The studies differed in the use of between-versus-within-subject designs, and by using food or water as the goal reinforcer. In Experiment 1, using food as the goal reward, subjects primed with food 0 sec pretrial conditioned slower than subjects primed 75 sec pretrial. In Experiment 2, using water as the goal reward, subjects primed with food 0 sec pretrial conditioned faster. These differences were evident on both prefed trials and on nonprefed test trials. Experiments 3 and 4 showed an opposite pattern of results when within-subject comparisons of 0- and 75-sec pretrial intervals were used: Food priming immediately pretrial facilitated food-rewarded running but inhibited water-rewarded running. The results suggest prefeeding has differential effects on acquisition and performance of instrumental behavior, and also depending upon the similarity of the priming and goal reinforcers.     

Impacts of role perceptions on organizational commitment,job involvement,and psychosomatic illness among three vocational groupings

This study involved an attempt to assess the comparative influences of perceived role conflict and role ambiguity on psychological investments in work roles (organizational commitment and job involvement) and on work-related psychosomatic illness. In addition, these influences were assessed within a cross-vocational framework in order to determine how obtained relationships may have differed across work roles based on three widely differing vocational groupings. Results indicate that the comparative influences of these two role perceptions differ with respect to the outcomes in question and with respect to differences in the complexity of work roles.