The Socioeconomic Status,Intelligence, and Psychometric Pattern of Native-Born White Homeless Men

Build-up of proactive interference (PI) with visual-picture and auditory-verbal input modalities and the subsequent release from PI following a change in modality was investigated in three experiments with boys and girls, as follows: Experiment I (n = 64) at two mean age levels, 7–6 and 10–5; Experiment II (n = 64) at mean age 7–6; and Experiment III (n = 48) at age 11–4. PI build-up occurred in both modalities for all ages tested. Release from PI occurred following a change from auditory to visual input but not following a visual to auditory shift. In the final experiment, this asymmetrical improvement in performance was dependent upon an interaction between the modality of the input and distractor task on the final or release trial; changing to visual input produced a release effect regardless of the distractor task modality, while auditory input was associated with improvement in recall if a visual distractor task was employed whether or not a shift in input modality had occurred. This improvement was hypothesized to represent a decrease in retroactive interference rather than a release from proactive interference.     

Linguistic and nonlinguistic auditory processing of rapid vowel formant (F2) modulations in university students with and without developmental dyslexia

To help resolve the issue of whether developmental dyslexia (DD) is related to central auditory processing deficits or to language-specific processing deficits, we had nine dyslectic and nine nondyslectic right-handed undergraduate students perform linguistic (Experiment 1: phoneme identification) and nonlinguistic (Experiment 2: formant rate change detection) tasks. In Experiment 1, subjects listened to synthetic vowels whose second formant (F2) was modulated sinusoidally with F1, F3, and F4 held constant. F2 modulation rate (4-18 Hz) was manipulated within and across stimuli. The groups did not differ in phoneme identification. Experiment 2 was run three times and showed that the control subjects' performance improved across runs whereas the dyslexics' deteriorated across runs (p < .0001), suggesting practice and fatigue effects, respectively. Performance on the two experiments correlated significantly and negatively for the dyslexic subjects only. These results suggest that resource depletion or frontal lobe dysfunction may be implicated in developmental dyslexia.     

Type-specific proactive interference in patients with semantic and phonological STM deficits

Prior neuropsychological evidence suggests that semantic and phonological components of short-term memory (STM) are functionally and neurologically distinct. The current paper examines proactive interference (PI) from semantic and phonological information in two STM-impaired patients, DS (semantic STM deficit) and AK (phonological STM deficit). In Experiment 1 probe recognition tasks with open and closed sets of stimuli were used. Phonological PI was assessed using nonword items, and semantic and phonological PI was assessed using words. In Experiment 2 phonological and semantic PI was elicited by an item recognition probe test with stimuli that bore phonological and semantic relations to the probes. The data suggested heightened phonological PI for the semantic STM patient, and exaggerated effects of semantic PI in the phonological STM case. The findings are consistent with an account of extremely rapid decay of activated type-specific representations in cases of severely impaired phonological and semantic STM.     

Presentation modality and proactive interference in short-term retention using a mixed-morality distractor task

Two experiments investigated the release from PI following a shift in mode of presentation of the study words. In each experiment, the interpolated task required processing of both auditory (A) and visual (V) information. The results were the same with mixed lists (Experiment I) and with independent groups (Experiment II): A release from PI was obtained following an A to V shift but not following a V to A shift. It was concluded that the mixed-modality filler task has functional characteristics very similar to those of an A filler and that the filler task influences the memory code for study items.     

The influence of selective attention in peripheral and foveal vision

Previous research had indicated that there were differences in the kinds of stimulus information processed by concentrated and distributed attention in peripheral vision. Concentrated attention was necessary for perceiving line arrangement differences, while line slant differences could be detected with distributed attention. However, experiments with foveal presentation showed no facilitation by concentrating attention. Experiment I replicated these results. Experiment II showed that distributed attention did degrade foveal line arrangement discrimination if the attention system was overloaded by increasing the number of elements in the array. Experiment III demonstrated that high element density was not a sufficient condition for these effects to occur. Line arrangement discrimination was reduced as letter number increased even when maximum density was held constant. In Experim~ent IV, it was shown that concentrating attention facilitated line arrangement discrimination relative to line slant discrimination in foveal vision when element number and density were held constant. The results are discussed in terms of several models postulating a difference between spread-out and concentrated attention systems.     

语音短时记忆与词汇知识对第二语言词汇学习的影响

选取两种语音熟悉程度不同的非词为实验材料,把语音短时记忆区分为项目短时记忆和序列短时记忆,考察语音短时记忆与词汇知识对汉英双语者第二语言（英语）词汇学习的影响。实验1采用产出性的方式进行学习,结果发现,词汇知识与项目短时记忆对语音熟悉非词的学习起预测作用;词汇知识与序列短时记忆对语音不熟悉非词学习起预测作用。实验2采用接受性的方式进行学习,结果发现,项目短时记忆、序列短时记忆和词汇知识都对语音熟悉非词学习起独立的预测作用;项目短时记忆和序列短时记忆对语音不熟悉非词学习起独立的预测作用。实验结果表明,语音短时记忆和词汇知识都是影响英语词汇学习的重要因素。具体而言,学习语音熟悉的词汇,词汇知识起着更为重要的作用;学习语音不熟悉的词汇,语音短时记忆、特别是序列短时记忆起着更为重要的作用,而且两者作用的大小随着词汇学习方式的不同而发生变化。     

Release from Pl in running memory: What does this tell us about developmental STM?

Several theories consider the development of short-term memory (STM) in children to reflect the development of processing operations. This article reports an experiment that tested some of these theories, using a release from proactive interference (PI) procedure in conjunction with a running memory task, to track down age-related improvements in the processing of various kinds of information. Although evidence for the development of PI release with age appeared for two kinds of information, namely class of item and acoustic similarity, there was no evidence whatsoever for the existence of a relationship between STM performance and PI release. It was concluded that the development of STM on the one hand, and of the capacity to process item or acoustic information on the other, proceed independently of each other. The discussion deals with the apparent conflict between this conclusion and the theoretical positions.     

The phonological similarity effect in serial recognition

An experiment is reported examining the effect of consistent phonemic similarity among list items on memory retention in a task that is independent of overt speech production, the serial recognition task. Lists of consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words and nonwords were constructed such that although phoneme overlap was manipulated (i.e., shared vowel and final consonant [_VC], initial consonant and vowel [CV_], or the two consonants [C_C]), similarity remained constant. The results show that the influence of sub-syllabic mechanisms on STM performance is independent of speech production processes, and similarity in the pattern of results suggests that the same mechanisms subserve the recall of words and nonwords in STM. It is argued that the results are more consistent with psycholinguistic models than nonlinguistic models of STM, and implications for current STM models are discussed.     

The phonological similarity effect in serial recognition

An experiment is reported examining the effect of consistent phonemic similarity among list items on memory retention in a task that is independent of overt speech production, the serial recognition task. Lists of consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words and nonwords were constructed such that although phoneme overlap was manipulated (i.e., shared vowel and final consonant [_VC], initial consonant and vowel [CV_], or the two consonants [C_C]), similarity remained constant. The results show that the influence of sub-syllabic mechanisms on STM performance is independent of speech production processes, and similarity in the pattern of results suggests that the same mechanisms subserve the recall of words and nonwords in STM. It is argued that the results are more consistent with psycholinguistic models than nonlinguistic models of STM, and implications for current STM models are discussed.     

Capacity demands of phoneme selection in word production: new evidence from dual-task experiments

Three dual-task experiments investigated the capacity demands of phoneme selection in picture naming. On each trial, participants named a target picture (Task 1) and carried out a tone discrimination task (Task 2). To vary the time required for phoneme selection, the authors combined the targets with phonologically related or unrelated distractor pictures (Experiment 1) or words, which were clearly visible (Experiment 2) or masked (Experiment 3). When pictures or masked words were presented, the tone discrimination and picture naming latencies were shorter in the related condition than in the unrelated condition, which indicates that phoneme selection requires central processing capacity. However, when the distractor words were clearly visible, the facilitatory effect was confined to the picture naming latencies. This pattern arose because the visible related distractor words facilitated phoneme selection but slowed down speech monitoring processes that had to be completed before the response to the tone could be selected.     

Phoneme monitoring and lexical processing: Evidence for associative context effects

In this paper, we propose a new version of the phoneme monitoring task that is well-suited for the study of lexical processing. The generalized phoneme monitoring (GPM) task, in which subjects detect target phonemes appearing anywhere in the test words, was shown to be sensitive to associative context effects. In Experiment 1, using the standard phoneme monitoring procedure in which subjects detect only word-initial targets, no effect of associative context was obtained. In contrast, clear context effects were observed in Experiment 2, which used the GPM task. Subjects responded faster to word-initial and word-medial targets when the target-bearing words were preceded by an associatively related word than when preceded by an unrelated one. The differential effect of context in the two versions of the phoneme monitoring task was interpreted with reference to task demands and their role in directing selective attention. Experiment 3 showed that the size of the context effect was unaffected by the proportion of related words in the experiment, suggesting that the observed effects were not due to subject strategies.     

Generality of persistence: The role of stimulus and response factors in persistence to punishment

Previous research has shown that intermittent punishment of a response increases its persistence to continuous punishment and that intermittent punishment training in one situation produces persistence to continuous punishment in other situations. Experiment 1 showed that as long as the instrumental response and punishing stimulus were held constant from intermittent to continuous punishment marked differences between these situations had no decremental effect on persistence. Experiment 2 showed that intermittent punishment training of one response resulted in substantial persistence to continuous punishment of a different and apparently incompatible response and that such response change had no more than a marginal effect on persistence. The results were seen as requiring some revision to the traditional conditioning-model interpretation of persistence to punishment.     

Dissociations of the number and precision of visual short-term memory representations in change detection

The present study dissociated the number (i.e., quantity) and precision (i.e., quality) of visual short-term memory (STM) representations in change detection using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) and experimental manipulations. Across three experiments, participants performed both recognition and recall tests of visual STM using the change-detection task and the continuous color-wheel recall task, respectively. Experiment 1 demonstrated that the estimates of the number and precision of visual STM representations based on the ROC model of change-detection performance were robustly correlated with the corresponding estimates based on the mixture model of continuous-recall performance. Experiments 2 and 3 showed that the experimental manipulation of mnemonic precision using white-noise masking and the experimental manipulation of the number of encoded STM representations using consolidation masking produced selective effects on the corresponding measures of mnemonic precision and the number of encoded STM representations, respectively, in both change-detection and continuous-recall tasks. Altogether, using the individual-differences (Experiment 1) and experimental dissociation (Experiment 2 and 3) approaches, the present study demonstrated the some-or-none nature of visual STM representations across recall and recognition.     

Remembrance of places lasts: Proactive inhibition and patterns of choice in rat spatial memory

A series of experiments was carried out to evaluate the notion that rats given a sequence of massed daily trials on the radial maze reset working memory at the end of each trial by deleting its contents. Although curves presented by D. S. Olton [Scientific American, 1977, 236, 82–98; In S. H. Hulse, H. Fowler, & W. K. Honig (Eds.), Cognitive processes in animal behavior, Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum, 1978] show that rats return to errorless performance at the beginning of each trial after the first, the fact that accuracy falls less rapidly over choices on Trial 1 than on subsequent trials suggests a proactive inhibition (PI) effect. In Experiment 1, Olton's findings were replicated, and a PI effect was observed on Days 1–2 of testing. On Days 3–5, overall accuracy improved significantly and was associated with the development of a strong tendency for rats to enter adjacent alleys, which became particularly marked on the final trials of a day's testing. In order to prevent rats from achieving accurate performance by using an adjacent alleys pattern, a procedure was used in Experiment 2 which involved initial forced random choices followed by a retention test consisting of free choices. Repeated daily trials with this procedure yielded a significant PI effect, which was more marked at a 60-sec delay than at a 0-sec delay. Experiments 3 and 4 showed this PI effect to be robust and resistant to manipulations designed to produce release from PI. Both the PI effect and a strong tendency found in Experiment 1 for animals to avoid on the initial choices of Trial n those alleys most recently entered on Trial n?1 argue that rats do not reset working memory between trials.     

Influences of spoken word planning on speech recognition

In 4 chronometric experiments, influences of spoken word planning on speech recognition were examined. Participants were shown pictures while hearing a tone or a spoken word presented shortly after picture onset. When a spoken word was presented, participants indicated whether it contained a prespecified phoneme. When the tone was presented, they indicated whether the picture name contained the phoneme (Experiment 1) or they named the picture (Experiment 2). Phoneme monitoring latencies for the spoken words were shorter when the picture name contained the prespecified phoneme compared with when it did not. Priming of phoneme monitoring was also obtained when the phoneme was part of spoken nonwords (Experiment 3). However, no priming of phoneme monitoring was obtained when the pictures required no response in the experiment, regardless of monitoring latency (Experiment 4). These results provide evidence that an internal phonological pathway runs from spoken word planning to speech recognition and that active phonological encoding is a precondition for engaging the pathway.     

The relationship between language production and verbal short-term memory: The role of stress grouping

This study investigates the influence of stress grouping on verbal short-term memory (STM). English speakers show a preference to combine syllables into trochaic groups, both lexically and in continuous speech. In two serial recall experiments, auditory lists of nonsense syllables were presented with either trochaic (STRONG–weak) or iambic (weak–STRONG) stress patterns, or in monotone. The acoustic correlates that carry stress were also manipulated in order to examine the relationship between input and output processes during recall. In Experiment 1, stressed and unstressed syllables differed in intensity and pitch but were matched for spoken duration. Significantly more syllables were recalled in the trochaic stress pattern condition than in the iambic and monotone conditions, which did not differ. In Experiment 2, spoken duration and pitch were manipulated but intensity was held constant. No effects of stress grouping were observed, suggesting that intensity is a critical acoustic factor for trochaic grouping. Acoustic analyses demonstrated that speech output was not identical to the auditory input, but that participants generated correct stress patterns by manipulating acoustic correlates in the same way in both experiments. These data challenge the idea of a language-independent STM store and support the notion of separable phonological input and output processes.     

Evidence for a late-occurring effect of phoneme repetition during silent reading

Two reading experiments were conducted to investigate the effect of phoneme repetition during silent reading (also referred to as the visual tongue-twister effect, see McCutchen & Perfetti, 1982; Perfetti & McCutchen, 1982) in conjunction with end-of-clause and end-of-sentence wrap-up effects (Just & Carpenter, 1982; Rayner, Sereno, Morris, Schmauder, & Clifton, 1989). In both experiments, reading time was measured on sentences containing either six or zero words sharing the same initial phoneme. Sentences were presented in a phrase-by-phrase moving window, with each phrase either containing one word that involved a repeated phoneme or a matched word not involving a repeated phoneme. The sixth presentation region either contained or did not contain a comma (Experiment 1) or a period (Experiment 2). The results showed that the effect of phoneme repetition occurred relatively late during sentence processing, only after integration processing related to end-of-clause and end-of-sentence wrap-up occurred.     

Confusability and interference between members of parafoveal letter pairs

In each of three experiments, confusability between members of a parafoveally exposed pair of letters affected accuracy of identifying the peripheral, but not the central, letter. Confusability was determined from a confusion matrix developed for each subject. In Experiment 1, only one letter in each pair was identified on each exposure, and the position of pair members was varied over trials while the absolute position of the pair was held at a constant distance from fixation. In Experiment 2, both letters were identified on each exposure. In Experiment 3, the criterion letter was presented at a constant distance from fixation, and both letters were identified on each exposure. Since results in Experiment 3 were the same as in Experiments 1 and 2, the effect cannot be explained with reference to an interaction between confusability and acuity. The implications of the findings for various models of visual information processing are discussed.     

Expectations and Preferences for Sequences of Health and Money

Three experiments demonstrated that preferences for sequences of money differed from preferences for sequences of health. Undergraduates gave preference ratings for graphs that illustrated how monetary income or health quality might change over time, with total amount of money or health held constant. In Experiment 1, subjects expected to experience health that decreased over a lifetime; they also preferred such a sequence. In contrast, they expected to experience increasing monetary income over their lifetimes and preferred such monetary sequences. Experiment 2 showed that these different preferences for sequences of health and money did not hold true for short, 1-year sequences, where subjects had similar expectations about health and money. Experiment 3 replicated Experiment 2 and showed that expectations mediate the effect on preference of decision domain (health or money) and sequence length. These results point to the importance of expectations in forming preferences for sequences.     

Dissociable lexical and phonological influences on serial recognition and serial recall

The impact of the lexicality of memory items on memory performance was compared in two paradigms, serial recall and serial recognition. Experiments 1 to 3 tested 7- and 8-year-old children. Memory accuracy was only mildly impaired in lists containing nonwords compared with words in a serial recognition task involving judgements of whether the items in two sequences were in the same order (Experiment 1), although a substantial advantage for word over nonword items from the same stimulus pool was found in serial recall (Experiment 2). A stronger influence of lexicality on serial recall than serial recognition was further demonstrated in Experiments 3A and 3B, and in 4A and 4B using adult participants. These experiments also established comparable degrees of sensitivity to the phonological similarity of the memory sequences in the two paradigms. The phonological similarity effect in serial recall was found to arise from increased phoneme order errors, whereas the lexicality effect was due principally to the greater frequency of phoneme identity errors for nonwords. It is proposed that the lexicality effect originates in the redintegration of item information just prior to recall, and that this process is largely bypassed in serial recognition.