Abstract
Shaughnessy (1976) suggested that displaced rehearsals may occur in incidental learning when orienting tasks that involve subjective rating scales are used. In the present experiment, evidence supporting this hypothesis was obtained by extending the strategy Wood and Underwood (1967) developed for tracking rehearsals in intentional learning. The study list consisted of the blocked presentation of eight instances of each of five color sense-impression categories. A pronounced within-category primacy effect was found in recall when the orienting task required rating each item’s association to the appropriate color, but not when a different concept was used for rating each item. When orienting tasks are to be used to control the encoding of individual items, investigators should avoid using the same subjective rating scale for several items.
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I am grateful to three students for their contributions to this research. Mark S. Chockley prepared the stimulus materials, collected the majority of the data, and commented critically on an earlier draft of the manuscript. Jocelyn L. Mand and Jonathan A. Smeenge assisted in the data collection. I also want to thank my colleagues, David G. Myers and Eugene B. Zechmeister, for their helpful comments. Preparation of this manuscript was facilitated by a Hope College faculty development grant made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
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Shaughnessy, J.J. Subjective rating scales and the control of encoding in incidental learning. Bull. Psychon. Soc. 14, 205–208 (1979). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03329445
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03329445