I Recognise You but I Can't Place You: An Investigation of Familiar-only Experiences during Tests of Voice and Face Recognition

In this paper, we examine in detail the situation in which a subject finds that a face or voice is familiar but is unable to retrieve any biographical information about the person concerned. In two experiments, subjects were asked to identify a set of 40 celebrities either from hearing their voice or from seeing their face. Although many more celebrities were identified and named in response to their face than their voice, the results showed that there was a very large number of occasions when a celebrity's voice was felt to be familiar but the subject was unable to retrieve any biographical information about the person. This situation occurred less frequently in response to seeing a celebrity's face; when a face was found familiar, the subject was much more likely to be able to recall the celebrity's occupation. The possibility that these results might have come about because subjects were using different criteria to determine familiarity in the face and voice conditions was investigated and discounted. An additional finding was that when subjects found a face to be familiar-only, they were able to recall significantly more additional information about the person when they were cued by the person's voice than when they simply saw the face again. These results are discussed in relation to the models of person recognition put forward by Bruce and Y oung (1986) and Burton, Bruce, and Johnston (1990).     

NONCONTINGENT PRESENTATION OF ATTENTION AND ALTERNATIVE STIMULI IN THE TREATMENT OF ATTENTION-MAINTAINED DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR

Previous research has demonstrated that destructive behavior may be reduced through noncontingent presentation of attention when attention is identified as the stimulus responsible for behavioral maintenance. Because it may not always be possible to deliver attention in all situations, we examined the extent to which alternative stimuli that have been identified through a choice assessment would substitute for attention (the functional analysis—based reinforcer) in a noncontingent reinforcement procedure. Prior to treatment, functional analyses demonstrated that the destructive behavior of 2 clients with mental retardation was maintained by adult attention. Next, a stimulus choice assessment identified highly preferred tangible items for the 2 clients. Finally, we compared the effectiveness of two noncontingent reinforcement procedures: continuous noncontingent access to attention and continuous noncontingent access to the tangible item identified in the choice assessment. For both clients, these noncontingent reinforcement procedures reduced destructive behavior. The results are discussed in terms of the clinical implications for the treatment of destructive behavior using functional and alternative stimuli.     

THE USE OF POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE REINFORCEMENT IN THE TREATMENT OF ESCAPE-MAINTAINED DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR

We identified 3 clients whose destructive behavior was sensitive to negative reinforcement (break from tasks) and positive reinforcement (access to tangible items, attention, or both). In an instructional context, we then evaluated the effects of reinforcing compliance with one, two, or all of these consequences (a break, tangible items, attention) when destructive behavior produced a break and when it did not (escape extinction). For 2 clients, destructive behavior decreased and compliance increased when compliance produced access to tangible items, even though destructive behavior resulted in a break. For 1 client, extinction was necessary to reduce destructive behavior and to increase compliance. Subsequently, when the schedule of reinforcement for compliance was faded for all clients, destructive behavior was lower and fading proceeded more rapidly when compliance produced multiple functional reinforcers (i.e., a break plus tangible items or attention) and destructive behavior was on extinction. The results are discussed in terms of the effects of relative reinforcement value and extinction on concurrent operants.     

The effects of different types of retrieval cues on the recall of names of famous faces

The present study investigated the effects of cues on subjects’ abilities to retrieve the names of famous faces that they had previously been unable to recall. In Experiment 1 subjects were presented with a second photograph of the celebrity, or biographical information about the celebrity, or the celebrity’s initials. Each type of cue produced a quite different pattern of recall. Biographical information was least likely to elicit the name when the subject already knew the celebrity’s occupation, and most likely when subjects found the face familiar only. Conversely, initials were more likely to elicit the name when the occupation was already known than when the face was at first found unfamiliar or familiar only. Rather surprisingly, no significant differences were observed when a new photograph was used as a cue. In Experiment 2, the effects of a new photograph were compared with a condition in which the same photograph was presented twice. A new photograph was beneficial when subjects had previously found the face unfamiliar and when they found the face familiar only, but not when they knew the occupation. It is argued that these, as well as other aspects of the results, generally support the view that successive, but distinct stages are involved in face recognition, consistent with the model put forward by Bruce and Young (1986).     

The effects of different types of encoding task on memory for famous faces and names

In this study, incidental memory for familiar faces following different types of encoding task was investigated. Subjects who had been asked to name faces of celebrities at presentation subsequently remembered them significantly better than subjects who had been asked to provide contextual information about the faces, and than subjects who had been asked to distinguish them from unfamiliar faces. This effect persisted regardless of whether the tests required memory for names, faces, or biographical information. It is argued that these results can be explained in terms of the face-processing framework of Bruce and Young (1986) and the theory of episodic memory for faces put forward by Bruce (1982, 1988). However the findings are not consistent with levels of processing (Craik & Lockhart, 1972), nor transfer appropriate processing (Morris, Bransford, & Franks, 1977).     

Why are names of people associated with so many phonological retrieval failures?

Two experiments are reported that revisit the issue of why people’s names are more difficult to recall than common names such as the names of objects. In Experiment 1, retrieval of the names of a set of object pictures was compared with recall of a set of names of famous faces. The object and face sets were matched for preexperimental familiarity. The results showed significantly more tip-of-the tongue (TOT) states and significantly poorer name recall for faces than for objects. Although the overall numbers of incorrect answers for the two sets of items did not differ, the incorrect answers in the face condition were mostly “don’t know” responses, whereas incorrect answers for objects were mostly alternative names. In Experiment 2, written definitions were used instead of pictures, and target items were selected so as to keep the number of alternatives to a minimum. Under these circumstances, there were no differences in either the number of items correctly named or the number of TOTs for common and people’s names. These findings are consistent with the views of Brédart (Memory, 1, 351–366, 1993), who argued that there are fewer documented TOTs for common names because a semantically related alternative often comes to mind when a participant is experiencing, or is about to experience, a retrieval failure.     

Differential responding in the presence and absence of discriminative stimuli during multielement functional analyses

We evaluated the extent to which discriminative stimuli (S(D)s) facilitate differential responding during multielement functional analyses. Eight individuals, all diagnosed with mental retardation and referred for assessment and treatment of self-injurious behavior (SIB) or aggression, participated. Functional analyses consisted of four or five assessment conditions alternated in multielement designs. Each condition was initially correlated with a specific therapist and a specific room color (S(D)s), and sessions continued until higher rates of target behaviors were consistently observed under a specific test condition. In a subsequent analysis, the programmed S(D)s were removed (i.e., all conditions were now conducted by the same therapist in the same room), and sessions continued until differential responding was observed or until twice as many sessions were conducted with the S(D)s absent (as opposed to present), whichever came first. Results indicated that the inclusion of programmed S(D)s facilitated discrimination among functional analysis conditions for half of the participants. These results suggest that the inclusion of salient cues may increase either the efficiency of functional analyses or the likelihood of obtaining clear assessment outcomes.     

On the effectiveness of and preference for punishment and extinction components of function-based interventions

The current study describes an assessment sequence that may be used to identify individualized, effective, and preferred interventions for severe problem behavior in lieu of relying on a restricted set of treatment options that are assumed to be in the best interest of consumers. The relative effectiveness of functional communication training (FCT) with and without a punishment component was evaluated with 2 children for whom functional analyses demonstrated behavioral maintenance via social positive reinforcement. The results showed that FCT plus punishment was more effective than FCT in reducing problem behavior. Subsequently, participants' relative preference for each treatment was evaluated in a concurrent-chains arrangement, and both participants demonstrated a dear preference for FCT with punishment. These findings suggest that the treatment-selection process may be guided by person-centered and evidence-based values.     

An example of discovery research involving the transfer of stimulus control

The initial purpose of the present study was to replicate procedures for teaching preschool children to recruit attention at appropriate times by having an experimenter signal the availability and unavailability of attention (i.e., arrange a multiple schedule involving reinforcement and extinction; Tiger & Hanley, 2004). Following the development of discriminated social responding, the schedule-correlated stimuli were removed (i.e., a mixed schedule of reinforcement was arranged). However, discriminated responding continued during these conditions. Further evaluation suggested that stimulus control over children's social responding had transferred from the schedule-correlated stimuli to the delivery of reinforcement. The effect of a history of reinforcement under multiple-schedule conditions on performance under mixed schedules was then replicated with 2 participants in a reversal design. These findings suggest that following experience with schedule-correlated stimuli, these stimuli may be removed with only modest disruption to discriminated responding.