Improvement of Recognition on a Multi-Modal Pattern Discrimination Test

Abstract

A multi-modal test of pattern discrimination, including vision, hearing, active and passive touch, is described. It measures changes in veridicality of recognition as a result of two kinds of treatment: variation in pattern definition or context and practice effects. The test consists essentially of stable familiar geometrical figures in the foreground against a background of graduated “noise” in the same modality as the embedded figure. 240 Ss, divided into four groups (one of each modality) were employed. Ss were exposed to corrective feedback, repeated exposure or a control condition and to a random presentation of varying background for each of the foreground figures in a particular modality. Results indicated that both practice and background noise level affected veridicality of recognition.

“The Birth of a Test”: The Sensory Quotient

“…The Sensory Quotient (SQ) test, at present a multi-modal pattern-discrimination test individually administered, was originally described in this journal ( 3 ) when the ease in improvement of recognition on corrective feedback, was also reported. Since then the test has been applied to a 10% random cross-sectional sample of the employees at the headquarters of an electronic and computer industry, in order to determine whether the SQ could differentiate the occupational groupings within the company, whether such differences were predictable by experts within and outside the company and whether the sensory profile related significantly to other variables such as IQ, sex, education, age, years of ernployment, etc.…”