What are the processes involved in constructing a linear order from a set of relations between pairs of elements in the order? Subjects were presented with sets of digit pairs and instructed to form a single digit string on the basis of the order relations expressed by the pairs; for example, given 57, 19, 71, the correct response is 5719. Manipulations of presentation order revealed constructive processes of varying difficulty depending on whether a pair has zero, one, or two digits in common with the digits held in memory as an incomplete, constructed string. The least difficult processes arise when there is one common element. If the common element occurs at the end of the string in memory, construction is easier than when the new digit must be added to the beginning of the string. When a pair has no digits in common with the string in memory, constructing the correct string becomes substantially more difficult, especially when subsequent pairs having two digits in common require that a tentative order of digits held in memory be reorganized.

Sciences (ARI) has been investigating soldiers' retention of skills and knowledge learned during training. How well a soldier remembers what was learned in training influences how well a soldier can later perform a task and determines the frequency with which retraining needs to occur. Understanding the nature of skill retention thus has important implications for both Army training and personnel policy.The research reported here summarizes over 25 years of work on the topic of skill retention. The report emphasizes research performed by ARI, but also includes relevant research by other military and academic laboratories. Products from ARI research include a model for predicting skill retention, endorsed by TRADOC and applied numerous times, most recently to the 'peace support operations' tasks trained to troops deploying to Bosnia. This research has also led to personnel policy changes, such as increasing the window (from 12 months to 24 months following active duty) for the initial recall of soldiers from the Individual Ready Reserve in the event of a mobilization. We plan to continue research on skill retention issues, focusing on the digital skills required for the decentralized, fluid, fast-paced operations of the future.

Six subjects decided whether pairs of adjectives had same or different meanings. Stimuli were 48 first words paired with two synonyms, one antonym, and one unrelated word. Pairs were presented visually, with a delay, interstimulus interval, or ISI, of 0-700 msec between onset of the first word and presentation of the second word. Reaction times, RTs, for "same" and "different" responses were measured from onset of the second word with each of eight delays. The maximum decrease in RT from that with a zero delay was taken as a measure of encoding time, ET, for the first word. This ET was interpreted as the time taken to identify a word and to retrieve from memory meaning information sufficient for successful comparison. The RT X ISI functions obtained were consistent with serial processing. Further support for serial processing was provided by the independence of the effects of first-and second-word length on RT and ET. The average ET was 183 msec, a value in agreement with earlier gross estimates. Words in antonym pairs yielded longer ETs than the same words in synonym or unrelated pairs, apparently reflecting the need for greater information retrieval. The sensitivity of the method as a measurement technique was demonstrated by detection of small but significant effects for word length and frequency.

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Two experiments examined the construction of linear orderings (e.g., ABCD) from presented pairs of adjacent items (e.g., AB, BC, CD) in an attempt to determine why some orders of presentation are more difficult than others. Experiment 1 found order effects when participants constructed orderings but not when they simply recalled presented pairs, suggesting that order effects reflect processing difficulties encountered during construction. Experiment 2 used several different orders and successive and simultaneous visual presentation of pairs. Results showed that order effects can be attributed to the memory load imposed by certain pairs, the type of processing demanded, the need to reorder previously stored information, and the loss of information with continued rehearsal. Results strongly support the Foos, Smith, Sabol, and Mynatt (1976) model of linear construction.Several recent studies have presented individuals with information about adjacent items in a linear ordering (e.g, AB, BC, CD) and asked the individuals to construct the ordering (e.g., ABeD). Performance is affected by the order in which information is presented (Foos, Smith, Sabol, & Mynatt, 1976), the strategy that participants adopt in representing presented information (Mynatt & Smith, 1977), the completeness of the underlying ordering (Foos, 1980), the number of items in the ordering (Foos, 1980), the relationship between a sentence adjective and an item's placement (Potts & Scholz, 1975), and various combinations of the above (Foos, 1980). The present paper examines the effects produced by presentation order in an attempt to determine whether these effects can be attributed to the need for different processing for different inputs or simply to differences in the amount of information that must be held in store pending recall. Foos et al. (1976) describe three major effects produced by the order in which adjacent pairs of items are presented to persons attempting to construct the underlying ordering. The first of these occurs when pairs of items, after the initial pair, contain one old (i.e., previously presented) and one new item. These are called match (M) pairs, since they allow the individual The authors wish to thank an anonymous reviewer for helpful suggestions in preparation of the final version of this article and to acknowledge the support of National Science Foundation GrantBNS to match the input pair with previously stored information via the old item. If an individual has stored some information (e.g., Be), there are two kinds of M pairs that can be presented. In one case, the input will add a new item to the end of the previous information string (e.g., CD to produce BCD), and in the other case, to the beginning (e.g., AB to produce ABC). The former is called Process M1, and the latter, Process M2. Presentation orders produce better performance as the number of M1 pairs exceeds the number of M2 pairs.The second effect of presentation order occurs when all the pairs are not M pairs. When one presents a pair of new, and thus nonmat...