Motor skill acquisition and retention as a function of average feedback, summary feedback, and performance variability

Summary feedback involves withholding feedback from subjects until the last trial in a block is completed, and then presenting feedback about each trial. A variation of this method, called average feedback (Young & Schmidt, 1992), presents subjects with only the mean of the trial block. We investigated whether these methods have similar effects on acquisition and retention of a simple motor skill. Five groups of subjects (n = 16 per group) performed 60 acquisition trials of an aiming task involving both spatial and temporal accuracy. We presented average and summary feedback based on either 5-trial blocks or 15-trial blocks and compared these schedules with every-trial feedback. During acquisition, all groups improved with practice, with a slight tendency for the every-trial condition to have less absolute error than the longer summary and average conditions. Analysis of delayed no-feedback retention tests, however, revealed a strong advantage for the 5-trial summary and average conditions compared with the every-trial condition. In addition, we found that for long blocks of acquisition trials without augmented feedback, the performance variability of those trials was associated with retention performance. Results are discussed in terms of how these different manipulations may make feedback less useful during acquisition, but foster the use of certain information processing activities that enhance overall learning.     

学前儿童对汉语副词的理解和运用

在汉语中,副词是一种比较独特的词类,它没有具体形象的物体可作为理解支柱,因而儿童对它的掌握较晚。在各类副词中,５、６岁儿童对范围副词的理解最佳,时间副词次之,程度副词最差。三者的差异均有非常显著性意义。即使在每一类副词中,由于儿童概念发展的不均衡性,掌握的顺序也有先后。     

Teaching simple addition to children with mental retardation using a microcomputer

Computer assisted instruction (CAI) was used for improving the efficiency of simple addition (single-digit without carrying) computation in three children with mental retardation. The training program, conducted on a portable personal computer, consisted of demonstrations and repetitive practices on simple addition presented in a vertical format. A number of behavioral instruction techniques such as direct feedback, corrective demonstration, verbal association, and token reinforcement were also included. To evaluate the effects of the CAI package, a multiple-baseline across subjects design with followup was employed. Results showed that performances of children improved with training and were maintained at 1-week, 4-week, and 12-week followups. Generalization of the learned skills was evident when children were assessed on a paper-and-pencil addition test in a vertical format. The skills were also transferable, with initial prompting, to a computerized addition test in a horizontal format. These findings reaffirmed the applicability of CAI and behavioral techniques for teaching math skills to children with mental retardation.     

Teaching spontaneous requests to children with autism using a time delay procedure with multi-component toys

Children with autism were taught spontaneous requests through a time delay procedure. Unlike previous research, which usually employed food as the target stimuli to be requested, the present study used toy pieces from multi-component toys. The procedure involved presenting a child with the target stimulus, with the trainer prompting the child by immediately modeling the request response. When the response was imitated without error, prompting was delayed with the time interval gradually being increased over trials. A spontaneous or imitated response was reinforced by giving the child the requested object. As the stimulus/model interval increased, children with autism were expected to initiate the request by themselves prior to the prompt. The efficacy of the time delay procedure was assessed using a multiple baseline across subject design with three Chinese boys with autism. Results showed that the three children acquired a 100% performance within five to nine sessions of training and the skill was maintained at the one-month and three-month followups. Furthermore, the learned response transferred to various conditions when tested across setting, person, toy, and food items. These results suggest that toys, the multi-component ones in particular, served well as reinforcers for language training. Furthermore these findings confirmed the practical utility of the time delay procedure for promoting spontaneous communication skills in children with autism.     

A revised list of Spanish translations of operant terminology

The experimental analysis of behavior has grown enormously in Latin America within the last decade. This paper offers an updating revision of suggested Spanish translations of operant expressions.     

Sex differences in perceptions of interpersonal work style,career emphasis,supervisory mentoring behavior,and job satisfaction

This study examined the perceptions of career-oriented men and women with respect to their interpersonal work style, career emphasis, supervisory behavior, and job satisfaction based on their current or most recent work experience. The results show that women subjects in this study perceived themselves to be less assertive in work situations and also continued to emphasize home life over their career success and advancement when compared to men. In the context of supervisory behavior, women subjects perceived male supervisors as exhibiting less mentioning behavior towards them and had lower job satisfaction when compared to male subjects under male supervisors in the study. Some implications of these results with respect to training and career management were also discussed.     

Manual discrimination of force using active finger motion

In these experiments, two plates were grasped between the thumb and forefinger and squeezed together along a linear track. An electromechanical system presented a constant resistance force during the squeeze up to a predetermined location on the track, whereupon the force effectively went to infinity (simulating a wall) or to zero (simulating a cliff). The task of the subject was to discriminate between two alternative levels of the constant resistance force (a reference level and a reference-plus-increment level). Results of these experiments indicate a just noticeable difference of roughly 7% of the reference force using a one-interval paradigm with trial-by-trial feedback over the ranges 2.5≤F _o≤10.0 newtons, 5≤D≤30 mm, 45≤S≤125 mm, and 25≤V≤160 mm/sec, whereF _o is the reference force,D is the distance squeezed,S is the initial finger-span, andV is the mean velocity of the squeeze. These results, based on tests with 5 subjects, are consistent with a wide range of previous results, some of which are associated with other body surfaces and muscle systems and many of which were obtained with different psychophysical methods.     

Sexual experience, sex guilt, and sexual moral reasoning

Two studies are described in which the relations between sexual experience, sex guilt, and sexual moral reasoning were examined. Subjects were asked to articulate their opinions on each of six sexual activities, and then choose one of six statements (corresponding to Kohlberg's six stages of reasoning) that most clearly reflected why they had, or had not, engaged in three of those activities. An analysis of the moral reasoning present in each of the six articulated responses indicated that level of reasoning was inversely related to sex guilt. Analysis of the preference data indicated that subjects endorsed reasoning (statements) at a higher stage than they had articulated, and that this “gap” between articulation and preference was much greater for less experienced subjects. Results are discussed in terms of the utility of using situation-specific moral dilemmas when assessing moral reasoning, and in terms of the possible role that lack of sexual experience plays in inhibiting sexual moral development.