PERCEIVED SUBSTRUCTURES AND EMOTIONAL ATTITUDES TOWARDS A TEST BATTERY AND ITS PARTS

M ogensen , A. Perceived substructures and emotional attitudes towards a test battery and its parts. Scand. J. Psychol ., 1962, 3 , 30–32.—The potential value of an experimental and phenomenological approach for the study of the perception and cognition of ability tests is stressed. Some preliminary results from a pilot study of twelve students are given. The relationship between the subjects' emotional attitudes towards the tests and their perceptions and cognitions of the tests are briefly discussed.     

A perimetric study of visual field defects in monkeys

The visual fields of rhesus monkeys have been studied perimetrically before and after removal of parts of the striate cortex. The operations produced visual field defects of the expected size, shape, and position but an animal's ability to respond to a flash of light which appeared in the defective part of the field was diminished rather than abolished. It is suggested that this residual ability enables an animal to detect changes in illumination, which might be cues to other visual events. A study of fixation indicates that the animals probably do not recognize or respond to objects when they lie within the impaired region of the visual field. The results are compared with those found in earlier studies of simian and human subjects.     

The influence of an interpolated experience upon recognition

It was demonstrated in a previous experiment that an experience interpolated between an original experience and its recall may bring about changes in the points of emphasis in the recall of the original experience. Moreover, details of the interpolated experience may be recalled as if they had formed part of the original experience. These results were taken to mean that two experiences of a related kind may become merged in memory into something akin to Bartlett's notion of an organized mass of past experiences. In the experiment here reported, the original experience was the hearing of a story, and the interpolated experience the seeing of a picture which illustrated part of the story. When in a recognition test subjects were asked to select from three alternatives (including the original) the one version which was “most like the original story,” a proportion of them preferred to the original story a version which differed from the original by including a number of details from the picture. Asked about details, all the subjects tended to place details from the picture in the story, even if they had not been mentioned there. The results of the two experiments are thought to show that irreversible changes are brought about in the memory of an experience by subsequent experiences of a related kind.     

Effects of nitrous oxide on reactions to “stress”

It has been demonstrated that exposure to the stress of a situation involving conflict or frustration may interfere significantly with subsequent learning. Behaviour under stress is characterized by experiences of “anxiety” and by widespread physiological changes. Inhalation of nitrous oxide has the general effect of reducing the extent of these symptoms.

The present investigation using insoluble and soluble problems has demonstrated that both nitrous oxide and exposure to stress impair learning; but that, when subjects are exposed to stress while under the influence of the drug, the effects of the stress on subsequent learning are abolished. It is suggested that these empirical results may be accounted for either in terms of “anxiety-reduction” or in terms of transfer effects.