Latent inhibition: A developmental study

Abstract

Two latent inhibition experiments were conducted with children aged between 4.6 and 11.8 years. Experiment I sampled a middle socio‐economic class population. Within each age, there were four experimental groups which varied in the number of pre‐exposures to the stimulus that was later used as the reinforced stimulus in a discrimination learning test. Latent inhibition, i.e. poorer learning in the group pre‐exposed to the stimulus as compared with the non‐pre‐exposed group, was found to decrease with age. In Expt 2, children from a low socio‐economic level were presented with a similar design. The results were the same as in Expt 1 except that latent inhibition decreased, as a function of age, at a slower rate. In addition, when the stimulus which is subsequently used as the negative item is pre‐exposed there is no significant effect on subsequent learning in the discrimination test. The data are discussed in terms of Kendler's multi‐stage model of development and Lubow's conditioned attention theory.

Latent Inhibition Deficits in Hyperactive Children

“…This is the case in all of the visual studies that report LI (see Lubow, 1989). Those studies that have failed to get LI with masking (older children in Kaniel & Lubow, 1986, and in the present study) display the masking task in such a way that the subject must scan across the to-be-target stimulus. Preliminary data from our laboratory also suggests that the relative position of the masking task stimuli and the to-be-target stimulus is important in determining whether or not one obtains LI.…”

“…The apparatus, with the exception of the addition of a timing circuit for measuring response time, was the same as that used by Kaniel and Lubow (1986). The box for presenting stimulus cards was 43 X 29 X 10 cm.…”

“…The first goal, then, was to demonstrate such a difference. On the basis of a study by Kaniel and Lubow (1986), in which LI was obtained in 4.5-5.5-year-old middle class children and in 4.5-5.5-yearold as well as 5.5-6.5-year olds from a low socio-economic stratum, but not in older children, subjects between the age of 5 and 7 were chosen from the normal and hyperactive populations and subdivided into two age groups. Each age group was further subdivided into a pre-exposed group (PE) and a nonpre-exposed group (NPE).…”

Toward a Unified Model of Attention in Associative Learning

“…For example, it has been reported that blocking is not disrupted by amphetamine (Gray, Pickering, Gray, Jones, Abraham, 6 Hemsley, 1997), but the preexposure effect is (Gray, Pickering, Hemsley, Dawling, 6 Gray, 1992). As another example, it has been reported that blocking is weaker in young children than in adults (e.g., Lyczak 6 Tighe, 1975), but the preexposure effect is exhibited by children even without a masking task (e.g., Kaniel 6 Lubow, 1986). As another example, it has been reported that blocking is weaker in young children than in adults (e.g., Lyczak 6 Tighe, 1975), but the preexposure effect is exhibited by children even without a masking task (e.g., Kaniel 6 Lubow, 1986).…”

Attending, learning, and socioeconomic disadvantage: developmental cognitive and social neuroscience of resilience and vulnerability

“…). For example, Kaniel and Lubow had NPE children complete a discrimination task with cards displaying pictures of animals and plants, where the correct response was always the image of a plant at the top (a marble and verbal feedback were the rewards for younger and older children, respectively). The PE group did the same task but saw either images of small and large black or white squares (counterbalanced across groups) in the center of the cards.…”