When Does “Soar” Become “Sore”? Some Comments on the Chapter of Simpson and Kellas

Abstract

One of the problems for the field of semantic psychology and for any problem-solving effort is the “set” to employ methods and interpretations that have worked well in the past. In the field of problem solving the transfer of method or “set” to new problems was, long ago, shown to be efficient when it was appropriate but very costly when it was not (cf., e.g., Luchins, 1942). We believe that in extending the idea of inhibition to include their subject’s negative transfer in the word-naming task, Simpson and Kellas may be entering a blind alley. To be sure, the authors are aware of a problem for that interpretation, since inhibition generally declines with time; but they report, “We are conducting further research to examine whether there might have been some aspect of the present procedure that obscured an effect of lag.”