The Effect of Visual Stimulus Traces on Memory
Abstract
In the experiment, rows of eight letters were briefly flashed to Ss. Some rows were presented two or three times with from 0 to 3 intervening rows between each repetition. The Ss first reported (in writing) as many letters as possible and then were given a forced-choice recognition test for one of the letters in the row. The incorrect alternative in the forced choice was either an auditory confusion (AC) or a visual confusion (VC) for the correct letter. Improvement with repetition was found both for report and for recognition of nonreported letters over VCs. There was no improvement for recognition of non- reported letters over ACs. The improvement in report was small, about 2.5% over three repetitions and was fairly uniform for all positions in the row. The improvement in recognition over VCs was about 5% over three repetitions and occurred entirely in the last four positions of the row. The different pattern of improvement in these two cases suggested that improvement in recognition over VCs probably was based on an increase in letters seen on each repetition, whereas the improvement in report was based on a long-term accumulation, probably of response integration.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jun 01, 1971
- Accession Number
- AD0730947
Entities
People
- Allan Meakin Collins
Organizations
- University of Michigan