In a series of six experiments, undergraduate college students visually imagined letters or words and then classified as rapidly as possible the imagined letters for some physical property such as vertical height. This procedure allowed for a preliminary assessment of the temporal parameters of visual imagination. The results delineate a number of…

Recent theories of verbal memory have hypothesized that memory for a stimulus is not represented by a unitary memory trace, but rather by a coding on several attributes of the event. The present experiment tested the differential forgetting hypothesis in a unique way. Words were presented either visually (V) or auditorally (A) in a continuous…

The memory model, based on information theory proposed by Moser (see SE 013 578), was used to compare the cognitive processing patterns of second and eighth grade Negro and Caucasian students in solving the "parallel circuits" problem. (Connecting two light bulbs and a dry cell so that when both bulbs light, one bulb can be unscrewed,…

The present study investigated why it is that the more concrete the subject noun phrase of a sentence, the more likely the predicate is to be recalled when the subject noun phrase is the cue. The findings were that concretization dramatically influences both the probability of recognition of the subject noun phrase and the probability of recall of…

This speech reports an experiment on memory and verbal ability. The study notes that in previous research, verbal ability has been found to correlate with sensitivity to order, an important component of intelligence. This relationship may be due largely to the greater word store of high verbal scorers. The author's experimental hypothesis is that…

Two experiments are reported in which subjects performed simple mental arithmetic problems which were presented visually in a sequential fashion. At some point in the presentation of each problem, the sequential display was interrupted and a memory task introduced. The purpose was to validate a measure of transient memory load. (Author/RM)

A negative transfer paradigm was used to assess kindergarten, third-, and sixth-grade children's use of category relations in lists presented for recall. Results showed that negative transfer effects increased with age, with kindergarten children showing no evidence of interference relative to a control group. (Author/MP)

Three possible sources of memory span growth were tested with a modified version of the digit span task. Subjects were 18 students each from first, third, and sixth grades and from college. (Author/MP)

This study supported the hypothesis that the same prose passage would be stored in different memory locations as a function of its relationship to previous knowledge. Subjects told that a reading passage was about a famous person before reading the passage made more false positive errors in a recognition test. (Author/BH)

A reevaluation of a number of experiments suggests that normal and retarded persons differ on short-term memory tasks from the time of initial stimulus exposure. The hypothesis that memory differences are due to differential encoding as a result of more adequate rehearsal by the normal subjects is unacceptable. (Author/BW)

Some of the major assumptions and premises of Arthur Jensen's theory of Level I and Level II cognitive abilities are examined using a model of cognitive abilities recently proposed by Das, Kirby & Jarman (1975) and known as simultaneous and successive syntheses. Four areas are discussed: quantity versus type of information processing, internal…

Subjects differing in cognitive complexity formed impressions from either (1) three positive and three negative experimenter-selected traits; (2) three traits of each evaluation generated by the subject in a preliminary session; or (3) three experimenter-selected traits of one valence and three subject-generated traits of the opposite valence.…

Spanish-English bilinguals were tested for the speed with which they could recognize a word in one language as a member of a previously presented set of words in either language. Reaction time increased with the size of the presented set of words. Investigates the "translation effect" and its influence on information processing. (Editor/RK)

Minimizing memory deficits involves using cues; establishing learning conditions that reduce interference and result in adequate time to respond; and using advance organizers. Minimizing noncognitive factors affecting learning involves using the discovery method of teaching; reducing anxiety; and limiting the use of evaluation. (Author)

Nineteen normal male subjects received one milligram of physotigmine or one milligram of saline by slow intravenous infusion on two nonconsecutive days. Physostigmine significantly enhanced storage of information into long-term memory. Retrieval of information from long-term memory was improved. Short-term memory processes were not significantly…