| Abstract: | Following a 40-trial training procedure in which high and low incentive values were conditioned to stimulus dimensions, 276 children in Grades 2, 4, 5, and 6 were tested on an 80-trial, two-choice discrimination learning test. Differential, incentive associated, dimension preferences from training were hypothesized to facilitate or impair test performance by altering observing responses to the relevant dimension in which the correct stimulus eue was found. After exploring boundary conditions of instructions, incentive type. definition of samples as learners or nonlearners, and mode of stimulus presentation in training, the hypothesis was clearly confirmed for males in the second grade. Equivocal support was found for girls and for older children under varying experimental conditions. Results, taken together with back-ward learning curves, strongly suggest that differential incentive values influence the point at which learning starts, rather than slope or asymptoie. The application of attention theory under certain conditions was commended as a possible explanation for some past findings of acquisition differences as a function of different reinforcement values. |
