Syllabic and phonemic representations for short-term memory of speech stimuli

An experiment is reported which uses a same-different matching paradigm in which subjects are required to indicate whether the consonants of a pair of consonant-diphthong syllables are the same or different. The question addressed is the operation of two hypothesized processes in the perception of speech sounds. The auditory level is shown to hold stimulus information for a brief period of time and be sensitive to allophonic variations within a stimulus. Moreover, matching at this level takes place by identity of the syllables rather than of the separate phoneme segments. The phonemic level is impaired when the diphthong segments of the pair leads to a contradictory match to that of the consonants of the pair, even though only the consonants are relevant to the matching decision.     

Memory and display search in binary classification reaction time

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics - Character classification tasks and “same” “different” judgments of letter strings were examined with reference to major...     

An interresponse-time analysis of responding maintained by schedules of response-produced electric shock

The present study investigated ratio contingencies to evaluate factors that may determine the maintenance of responding when electric shock is the consequent event. Initially, squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus) were exposed to a continuous-avoidance schedule to initiate bar pressing. Subsequently, a multiple random-interval variable-ratio yoked schedule of response-produced shock was used to maintain and to compare interval and ratio performance. A microcomputer recorded and stored the number of responses and interresponse times occurring between successive shock presentations during a given random-interval component, and these numbers determined the ratio requirements during the subsequent ratio component. Responding was maintained for more than 80 sessions in two of three monkeys under the multiple schedule with the ratio yoked to the interval component. Responding during the ratio component persisted in only one monkey, however, when the components were no longer yoked. An analysis of the interresponse times immediately preceding shock under the multiple yoked schedule revealed that the terminal interresponse times were longer under the interval schedule than under the ratio contingency. The interresponse-time analysis indicated that differential interresponse-time relationships may be major determinants of the maintenance of behavior controlled by schedules of electric-shock presentation.     

Ginzberg's theory of occupational choice: A reanalysis of increasing realism

A causal model of indicators was derived from Ginzberg, Ginsburg, Axelrad, and Herma's developmental framework of occupational choice. This theoretical perspective suggests that high school age adolescents' “fantasy” choices are diverted into more “realistic” anticipations mainly through awareness of the work world and work roles and perceived “reality factors” (perceived goal-blocks) which function to inhibit the maintenance of such “fantasy” desires. Panel data from a three-state sample of nonmetropolitan Southern males interviewed while in the tenth-grade in 1966 and reinterviewed in 1968 were examined using path analytic models. Findings suggest that “realistic” choices (expectations) demonstrate an increasing dissociation from earlier “fantasy” choices (aspirations) primarily through the formation of perceived “reality factors.” An alternative model which incorporates race as a predetermined variable seems to indicate that racial differences in occupational knowledge affect the formation of perceived “reality factors” which are significant mediators of social origin for high school seniors' occupational expectations. While race affects occupational knowledge directly, most of the causal effects of race on 1968 expectations are actually due to the association of race with SES. Areas of other research are specified.     

Anonymity and Diversity: A Phenomenology of Self-Formation in Urban Culture

Topoi - In this paper, I show how phenomenological analysis of unreflective dimensions of our experience has implications for our participation in an increasingly urban and multicultural world. I...