Persistent structural priming from language comprehension to language production

To examine the relationship between syntactic processes in language comprehension and language production, we compared structural persistence from sentence primes that speakers heard to persistence from primes that speakers produced. [Bock, J. K., & Griffin, Z. M. (2000). The persistence of structural priming: transient activation or implicit learning? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 129, 177-192.] showed that the production of target priming structures increased the probability of spontaneously using the same structures to describe events in subsequent pictures that were semantically unrelated to the primes. These priming effects persisted across as many as ten intervening filler trials. The present studies replicated these results using auditorily presented primes to which participants only listened. The results indicated persistence of priming across all lags, with relative magnitudes of priming as large as those observed by Bock and Griffin. The implication is that structural priming is persistent regardless of the modality in which language structures are experienced, underscoring the power of priming as an implicit learning mechanism.     

Rule following and rule use in the balance-scale task

Quinlan et al. [Quinlan, p., van der Mass, H., Jansen, B., Booij, O., & Rendell, M. (this issue). Re-thinking stages of cognitive development: An appraisal of connectionist models of the balance scale task. Cognition, doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2006.02.004] use Latent Class Analysis (LCA) to criticize a connectionist model of development on the balance-scale task, arguing that LCA shows that this model fails to capture a torque rule and exhibits rules that children do not. In this rejoinder we focus on the latter problem, noting the tendency of LCA to find small, unreliable, and difficult-to-interpret classes. This tendency is documented in network and synthetic simulations and in psychological research, and statistical reasons for finding such unreliable classes are discussed. We recommend that LCA should be used with care, and argue that its small and unreliable classes should be discounted. Further, we note that a preoccupation with diagnosing rules ignores important phenomena that rules do not account for. Finally, we conjecture that simple extensions of the network model should be able to achieve torque-rule performance.     

Perceptual constraints and the learnability of simple grammars

Cognitive processes are often attributed to statistical or symbolic general-purpose mechanisms. Here we show that some spontaneous generalizations are driven by specialized, highly constrained symbolic operations. We explore how two types of artificial grammars are acquired, one based on repetitions and the other on characteristic relations between tones ("ordinal" grammars). Whereas participants readily acquire repetition-based grammars, displaying early electrophysiological responses to grammar violations, they perform poorly with ordinal grammars, displaying no such electrophysiological responses. This outcome is problematic for both general symbolic and statistical models, which predict that both types of grammars should be processed equally easily. This suggests that some simple grammars are acquired using perceptual primitives rather than general-purpose mechanisms; such primitives may be elements of a "toolbox" of specialized computational heuristics, which may ultimately allow constructing a psychological theory of symbol manipulation.     

Improving reading outcomes for children with learning disabilities: using brief experimental analysis to develop parent-tutoring interventions

The present study assessed the effects of summer parent tutoring on 3 children with learning disabilities using empirically derived reading interventions. Brief experimental analyses were used to identify customized reading fluency interventions. Parents were trained to use the intervention strategies with their children. Parents implemented the procedures during parent-tutoring sessions at home and results were measured continuously in high-word-overlap and low-word-overlap passages to determine whether generalization occurred. Parent and child satisfaction with the procedures was assessed. Results demonstrated generalized increases in reading fluency in both high-word-overlap and low-word-overlap passages as a function of parent tutoring. Also, acceptability ratings by children and their parents indicated that they viewed the interventions as acceptable and effective. Results are discussed in terms of structuring reading fluency interventions that promote generalization and maintenance of treatment effects.     

Learning from experience: Bion's concept of reverie and Buddhist meditation: A comparative study

The author argues for a common denominator between Bion's view and the Buddhist view of mental development. In both thought systems, mental growth is synonymous to learning from experience. The author closely examines Bion's concept of attention and compares it to mindfulness, a major factor in Buddhist meditation. In both doctrines, attention must be isolated from other mental processes in order to attain learning from experience. The author compares reverie to the state of mind of equanimity. She argues that enhancement of the ability of reverie, or improving the inner container such that it can hold any content while unmoved by desire, is the purpose of Buddhist practice. Both view the mind as capable of transcending its own restrictions and 'the capacity to know anything' as attainable through disciplined practice.     

Learning from experience in case conference: A Bionian approach to teaching and consulting

In case conferences as well as didactic seminars, the power of the group can bring psychoanalytic education to life. However, primitive anxieties activated by group dynamics may also interfere with teaching and learning. The authors offer the example of a stalemated private practice case conference that had unconsciously organized against learning as the members began to read Bion's work. The case conference leader, an analyst, presented her case conference, which was mired in basic assumption dependency dynamics, to our peer consultation group. Drawing upon Bion's early contributions on groups, as well as his later ideas about thinking and mental growth, the peer group facilitated the case conference's return to work-group functioning and learning from experience. Activated in the peer group, commensal container↔contained processes gradually spread throughout the entire relational system of peer group, case-conference leader, case-conference members, and patients. This example underscores the importance of promoting within our institutes a culture in which faculty view themselves as part of an evolving intersubjective matrix that works to foster the containing capacities of candidates, patients, and faculty alike.     

Oculomotor and manual indexes of incidental and intentional spatial sequence learning during middle childhood and adolescence

The goal of this study was to examine incidental and intentional spatial sequence learning during middle childhood and adolescence. We tested four age groups (8-10 years, 11-13 years, 14-17 years, and young adults [18+ years]) on a serial reaction time task and used manual and oculomotor measures to examine incidental sequence learning. Participants were also administered a trial block in which they were explicitly instructed to learn a sequence. Replicating our previous study with adults, oculomotor anticipations and response times showed learning effects similar to those in the manual modality. There were few age-related differences in the sequence learning indexes during incidental learning, but intentional learning yielded differences on all indexes. Results indicate that the search for regularities and the ability to learn a sequence rapidly under incidental conditions are mature by 8 to 10 years of age. In contrast, the ability to learn a sequence intentionally, which requires cognitive resources and strategies, continues to develop through adolescence.     

European starlings are capable of discriminating subtle size asymmetries in paired stimuli

Small deviations from bilateral symmetry (fluctuating asymmetries) are cues to fitness differences in some animals. Therefore, researchers have considered whether animals use these small asymmetries as visual cues to determine appropriate behavioral responses (e.g., mate preferences). However, there have been few systematic studies of animals' abilities to visually discriminate such minor asymmetries. If the asymmetries cannot be discriminated, fluctuating asymmetry can not be a visual cue. Here, we report an investigation of European starlings' (Sturnus vulgaris) abilities to discriminate small size asymmetries. We trained starlings, through operant conditioning in a free-flight aviary, to discriminate achromatic, symmetric paired stimuli from size-matched asymmetric stimuli. By starting the learning process with a large asymmetry and progressing through sequential trials of decreasing asymmetry, we elucidated a behavioral limit to asymmetry discrimination. We found that starlings are capable of discriminating a 10% size asymmetry. There was weaker evidence for discrimination of 5% asymmetry but no evidence for signal discrimination at 2.5% size asymmetry. This level of asymmetry discrimination suggests that many size asymmetry cues in nature can be discriminated by birds. At each level of asymmetry discrimination, we also tested whether starlings could generalize their learned symmetry preference to unreinforced novel images. Consistent with previous findings, we found that starlings could generalize their symmetry preferences.     

Associative learning of discrimination with masked stimuli

Great controversy exists on whether associative learning occurs without awareness. In Experiment 1, 31 participants received discrimination training by repeated presentations of two stimulus sequences (S1_A → S2_A, and S1_B → S2_B), S1 being a masked stimulus. S2 were imperative stimuli for a reaction time (RT) task. After the acquisition phase, all participants were tested with 20 presentations of congruent (S1_A → S2_A and S1_B → S2_B) and incongruent (S1_A → S2_B and S1_B → S2_A) stimulus sequences. The RT in the testing phase was faster in congruent than in incongruent stimulus sequences. These results are considered strong evidence of associative learning without awareness of the contingency between the stimuli. A second experiment was designed with SOA varied between three groups (23, 58, and 117 ms). The results showed that the participants responded more quickly to congruent stimulus sequences and that the SOA did not affect RT. The SOA did not modify the effect of congruence either, although the interaction was near significance.     

Effects of decision-phase time constraints on emotion-based learning in the Iowa Gambling Task

Research employing the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) has frequently shown that learning is impaired in various clinical populations. However, precisely what constitutes "unimpaired" control group learning remains unclear. In order to understand some of the possible factors underlying variability in control group IGT performance, the present study sought to manipulate features of the task to intentionally disrupt learning. Specifically, the present study investigated the effects of time constraints on emotion-based learning during automated administration of the IGT. For two groups of participants, a time-constraint of either 2-s or 4-s was implemented during the critical decision making period, while a control group received no time constraint. We also evaluated participants' subjective experience after every block of 20 trials. Results demonstrated that the 2-s group differed significantly from the control group. Subjective experience measures revealed rapid development of awareness of the advantageous and disadvantageous decks among all three groups. Overall, our findings demonstrate, for the first time, the effects of decision-phase time constraints on emotion-based learning and indicate that the IGT reward/punishment schedules are to some extent cognitively penetrable.