Perruchet, Cleeremans, and Destrebecqz (2006) reported a striking dissociation between trends in the conscious expectancy of an event and the speed of a response that is cued by that event. They argued that this indicates the operation of independent processes in human associative learning. However, there remains a strong possibility that this…

Research on incidental sequence learning typically is concerned with the characteristics of implicit or nonconscious learning. In this article, the authors aim to elucidate the cognitive mechanisms that contribute to the generation of explicit, reportable sequence knowledge. According to the unexpected-event hypothesis (P. A. Frensch, H. Haider,…

Knowledge of sequential relationships enables future events to be anticipated and processed efficiently. Research with the serial reaction time task (SRTT) has shown that sequence learning often occurs implicitly without effort or awareness. Here, the authors report 4 experiments that use a triplet-learning task (TLT) to investigate sequence…

The experiments examined qualitative and quantitative changes in the dynamics of learning a novel motor skill (roller ball task) as a function of the manipulation of a control parameter (initial ball speed). The focus was on the relation between the rates of change in performance over practice time and the changing time scales of the evolving…

Three reaction time (RT) experiments using a modified Strenberg procedure were conducted to determine the number of memory representations maintained for perceptual (dot-pattern) concepts. (Editor)

A review of some recent experiments suggested that general similarity between words might successfully function as a structural principle for semantic memory. A spatial model based on that assumption is proposed. The relation of this model to network and set-theoretic models of semantic memory is discussed, as is the relation of this model for…

Assesses the influence of rehearsal on recognition reaction times for items from target lists of a length exceeding the span of immediate memory. Also determines what effect, if any, the length of the target list has on recognition latencies that involve only retrieval from inactive memory. (Author/RK)

Concerns the effects of instructions on classical conditioning of the GSR (galvanic skin response). It demonstrates that verbal conditioning of the GSR can be obtained using an innocuous unconditioned stimulus (UCS). Discusses implications for theories of human classical conditioning. (Editor/RK)

Article gives the results of a multiple-probe recognition memory investigation examining the importance of relationships between items in a memorized series (positive set). (Editor)