Establishing global and local correspondence between successive stimuli: the holistic nature of backward alignment

Reflection decisions on alphanumeric characters display systemic effects of disorientation, suggesting that subjects mentally rotate the stimulus to the upright (the uprighting process). However, response time also increases with increasing angular disparity between the current and preceding orientations. This occurs only when the current stimulus is brought into congruence with the preceding one (the backward alignment process). In the present study, we examined the hypothesis that the transformation that occurs in backward alignment in holistic even in tasks in which the uprighting process is likely to be piecemeal. Evidence supporting this hypothesis is presented on the basis of tasks requiring either classification of numbers (Experiments 1 and 3) and words (Experiment 2), or mirror image discrimination on letter pairs (Experiment 4). The results indicated that backward alignment establishes global correspondence between successive stimuli and is indifferent to local correspondence at the level of the constituent elements. The establishment of this global correspondence decreases with the number of elements in the stimulus (Experiment 5), but its effects are still observed for four-letter strings (Experiment 6).     

Book reviews

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis -     

Personality Psychology: Research Trends for 1993–1995

Articles published in five prominent personality journals for the three-year period 1993–1995 were reviewed in order to identify recent trends in personality research. Each article was assessed in terms of research methodology and content area. Research methodology has changed very little, the exceptions being a shift away from laboratory settings and a greater use of nonuniversity participants. Results for content demonstrate that over time certain topics emerge and fade from popularity. Current popular topics include traits, emotion/motivation, and health psychology. The general lack of advancement in methodology is discussed, and the current "hot topics" in content area are compared with those of the past. In addition, some comparisons are made between current personality research in North America versus research in Europe.     

Voluntary attention and the spacing effect

Three experiments were done to test the hypothesis that the spacing effect results from a voluntary decision by the subject to pay little attention to the second presentation (P₂) of an item when it occurs shortly after the first (P¹)- In all three experiments, the spacing of repetitions was varied. In Experiment I, allocation of attention was manipulated by pairing P₂ of some pictures with a signal that indicated high payoff for later retention. In Experiment II, attention was controlled more directly by requiring the subject, in one condition, to recite words aloud. In both experiments, the dependent variable was judged frequency. In neither experiment did the effect of the attention manipulation interact with that of the spacing of repetitions. In Experiment III, the number of eye fixations given a picture was taken to be a measure of attention. The number of fixations dropped from P₁ to P₂ to P₃, but was unaffected by the spacing of repetitions. The experiments provide no support for a voluntary attention explanation of the spacing effect.     

Factors affecting processing mode in visual search

Visual search was studied under a variety of conditions to clarify some differences among the results of previous investigations and to provide a testing ground for models of visual information processing. Display configuration, target and field composition, exposure duration, and display size (up to 16 elements) were among the parameters investigated. In some conditions, mean reaction time was essentially invariant with display size, while in other conditions it increased substantially and linearly with display size. Current models of visual information processing were evaluated in the light of these and previous findings; all were found wanting. The data seem to demand a system subject to flexible cognitive control processes.