Abstract
An experiment was conducted to determine the influence on Ss* performance in processing contingent information of: (1) relative frequency (D, the difference in major- and minor-axis cell frequencies of fourfold contingency tables), (2) number of events presented (N, or 20, 30, 40 events), (3) presence or absence of KR information, and (4) several levels of a correlational metric. Six Ss made predictive estimates of the state of a hypothetical system based on observations of sequentially presented categorical information regarding the status of its subsystems. The status information was derived from four-fold contingency tables representing 11 tetrachoric correlation coefficients within the approximate range of ±1.0. Results indicate estimates are most accurate as N increases, when based on positive contingencies, and that D can be an appropriate model of Ss’ estimate performance.
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The research reported in this paper was sponsored by the Aerospace Medical Research Laboratory, Aerospace Medical Division, Air Force Systems Command, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. This paper is identified as AMRL-TR-69-98. A more detailed analysis and discussion of this research relevant to human engineering interests may be found in AMRL-TR-68-135, “Use of contingent status information in diagnostic performance and related aspects for information design.” Further reproduction is authorized to satisfy the needs of the United States government.
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Mills, R.G. A relative frequency principle in processing contingent information. Psychon Sci 18, 215–217 (1970). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03335743
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03335743