Abstract
Items in a paired-associate task that may be encoded into concept classes are better remembered than items which must be coded individually. Three groups, one with 8 words and 8 responses, a second with 32 words and 8 responses, and a third with 32 words and 16 responses learned to a criterion of three correct trials, and after a seven day retention interval, were tested for recall. Although there were no differences in the error scores, the second group (32 words and 8 responses) showed shorter latencies during acquisition, and less increase of latencies over the retention interval. These differences were attributed to the greater number of effective repetitions per response, which was mediated by conceptual encoding of the stimulus words. It was suggested that a minimum of three instances is necessary to mediate conceptual encoding in tasks of this nature.
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1. This research was supported in part by the Joint Services Electronics Program (U. S. Army, U. S. Navy and U. S. Air Force) under Contract No. D. A. 28 043 AMC 00073 (E).
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Montague, W.E., Wearing, A.J. The retention of responses to individual stimuli and stimulus classes. Psychon Sci 9, 81–82 (1967). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03330769
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03330769