Acquiring conjunctive concepts: When and why does feature frequency affect feature identification?

According to frequency theories of concept attainment, acquisition of rule-governed concepts depends on discriminating relevant from irrelevant stimulus features on the basis of their respective frequencies of occurrence. Depending on the theorist, the critical frequency counts may be based on occurrence in all stimuli or on occurrence in positive instances only. Experiment 1 held frequency in positive instances constant and varied the frequency of irrelevant features in the negative category. High frequency was associated with impaired performance, but only when concept problems started with a negative instance. Experiment 2 demonstrated that some previous findings in the literature that were thought to support frequency theory also depended on problems starting with a negative instance. These findings are not easily reconciled with existing frequency theories. We attribute our results to high intercategory similarity, which is a correlate of high frequency of irrelevant features. In the context of a hypothesis-testing theory, we propose that a negative start stimulus proactively interferes with memory for information in the initial positive instance and that the extent of the interference depends on how similar negative instances are to positive instances.     

Recognition memoryfor pictorial events

Subjects viewed sequences of slides depicting everyday events, and in later recognition tests, they correctly rejected distractors that were inconsistent with some invariant of the event but falsely accepted consistent distractors. J. J. Jenkins has accounted for the differential recognition of consistent and inconsistent slides of pictorial sequences in terms of fusion, the abstraction of an event from a series of temporally related items. The conditions under which event fusion was likely to occur were manipulated in three experiments: degree of ordering of the action-sequence slides, semantic vs. nonsemantic orienting tasks during acquisition, and duration of retention interval Recognition performance was generally more accurate under conditions of semantic processing, ordered acquisition sequences (for the semantic task), and shorter retention intervals. However, these variables did not affect differential recognition of consistent vs. inconsistent slides. A further experiment showed that the absence of an effect of disordering acquisition sequences on differential recognition could not be attributed to subjects’ reordering the disordered sequences in a way consistent with the original event. The data did not support the hypothesis that recognition performance was based on fusion of events depicted by temporally ordered slide sequences. It was suggested that memory for featural detail is a relevant factor in performance.     

Prominent publications in cognitive psychology

This article identifies the 50 publications in cognitive psychology that were most frequently cited in the professional literature between 1979 and early 1982. The characteristics of these publications are discussed, and comparisons are made with other relevant findings.     

Mouse killing in rats induced by lesions of the medial hypothalamus or medial accumbens: short-term preoperative exposure to a mouse does not suppress the killing

Rats were either exposed or not exposed to a mouse in their living cage for a 48-hr period. At the end of this time a bilateral lesion was made in the medial accumbens region or in the medial hypothalamus. When tested 2 days postoperatively, the killing frequency among rats that had been exposed to mice preoperatively was not significantly lower than that of rats that were not preoperatively exposed. The ineffectiveness of preoperative experience in suppressing the mouse killing induced by medial accumbens and medial hypothalamic lesions is similar to that found previously with dorsal-median raphe lesions and olfactory bulb lesions and is in contrast to the ease with which preoperative experience prevents mouse killing induced by septal lesions and serotonergic lesions induced by 5,7-dihydroxytryptamine.     

The relationship of mathematics self-efficacy expectations to the selection of science-based college majors

The major purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship of mathematics self-efficacy expectations to the selection of science-based majors in college males and females. Based on results obtained from a pilot sample of college students, an instrument assessing mathematics self-efficacy expectations was developed. The items used in the mathematics self-efficacy scale included everyday math tasks, math problems, and math-based college courses. Subjects, 153 female and 109 male undergraduates, completed the mathematics self-efficacy scale, the Bem Sex Role Inventory, an adapted version of the Fennema-Sherman Mathematics Attitudes Scales, and a questionnaire concerning their college major choices. Results indicated that mathematics self-efficacy expectations were significantly related to the extent to which students selected science-based college majors, thus supporting the postulated role of cognitive mediational factors in educational and career choice behavior. In addition, the math-related self-efficacy expectations of college males were significantly stronger than were those of college females. Implications of the findings for the process of educational and career decision-making are discussed.     

TEACHING SELF-ADMINISTRATION OF SUCTIONING TO CHILDREN WITH TRACHEOSTOMIES

We examined the effectiveness of using dolls to teach young children with tracheostomies to self-administer a suctioning procedure. Four children between the ages of 5 and 8 years, who had had tracheostomies for 6 months or longer, participated. After skills were taught via doll-centered simulations, in vivo skills were evaluated. All of the training and probe sessions were conducted in the participants' classrooms or homes. Results of a multiple baseline design across subjects and skill components indicated that the performance of all children improved as a function of training. Skill maintenance was demonstrated by all participants during follow-up assessments conducted 2 to 6 weeks posttraining. Results of a questionnaire completed by caregivers and interviews with the children revealed high levels of satisfaction with the training procedures and outcomes.     

Effects of an intervention program for pregnant adolescents: Educational outcomes at two years postpartum

Examined postpartum effects of a school-based intervention program for pregnant adolescents. Interviews were conducted with 102 innercity black, low-income, school-aged mothers who had attended the program, and their academic and medical records were reviewed. For teenagers who had been poor students prior to becoming pregnant, a strong linear effect was found for duration of program attendance: with sufficient time in the program, poorer students became indistinguishable from better students in educational success. Most of the better students were educationally successful at 2 years postpartum, independent of their length of time in the program. For all students, longer durations of postnatal intervention were predictive of lower likelihood of subsequent childbearing. Numerous academic, medical, social, and demographic variables were ruled out as possible confounding factors that might have produced the positive educational outcomes for poorer students. The results suggest that adolescents who appear to have minimal academic promise prior to their pregnancy are nevertheless very responsive to school-based intervention.     

“Double Trouble”: An Introduction

This piece sets the scene for the inaugural addresses by Rosi Braidotti and Selma Sevenhuijsen which follow and provides background information on the history of women's studies in the Netherlands.     

Within-compound associations between the context and the conditioned stimulus

Three experiments were conducted to test for the presence of associations between contextual cues and the nominal conditioned stimulus (CS) in fear conditioning. Rats were given tone-footshock pairings and were tested for their fear of the nominal CS, the tone, in a different context. Experiments 1 and 2 demonstrated that rats given nonreinforced exposure to the training context following conditioning were less fearful of the CS. Experiment 3 indicated that additional footshock presentations in the training context following conditioning produced greater fear of the CS. In both procedures postconditioning treatments designed to directly alter only the associative strength of the training context yielded parallel changes in the conditioned response to the CS. These data suggest that within-compound associations are formed between the context and the CS during classical conditioning.