Stimulus exposure effects in human associative learning

Abstract

Learning that one cue (CS) predicts a second, salient cue (US) can often be slowed by prior exposure to one or both stimuli. In animals, CS±US learning is more strongly retarded following uncorrelated exposure to both CS and US than following exposure to the US alone. In this paper we present several studies showing a similar effect in humans, using a computer-based task. Experiments 1 and 2 used a between-groups design and demonstrated a strong CS/US exposure effect, whether or not the US was signalled by a neutral cue during exposure. Experiment 3 demonstrated similar effects using a within-subjects design. Overall, these results are consistent with several theoretical interpretations and suggest that uncorrelated CS/US exposure leads to a robust retardation of subsequent CS±US learning in humans.

Attention and associative learning in humans: An integrative review.

“…The simplest approach borrows directly from the learned irrelevance procedure originally developed by animal researchers (e.g., Mackintosh & Little, 1969). In a human version of this procedure (Myers, Oliver, Warren & Gluck, 2000), participants had to predict, on each trial, whether an outcome would occur (a rabbit appearing XQGHU D PDJLFLDQ ¶V KDW During training phase 1, for participants in a pre-exposed group, a red or green balloon was also presented on each trial, but the colour of this balloon was unrelated to whether the outcome occurred, which was randomly determined on each trial.…”

Back to the future: synaesthesia could be due to associative learning

“…Phenomenological sensation that a concurrent stimulus is present is likely to be determined by the strength of activation of the perceptual representation, which is likely to differ in the two scenarios. Namely, the amount of experience presented in a typical training study is dwarfed by that of a child in their developmental environment (Cohen Kadosh et al, 2005), and second-learned associations—which likely mediate neurotypical training effects in adults—often require more exposure before acquisition (Myers et al, 2000). Lesser opportunity to learn would result in a weaker association (Hull, 1943).…”

Latent learning in medial temporal amnesia: Evidence for disrupted representational but preserved attentional processes.

“…Myers, Oliver, Warren, & Gluck (in press) demonstrated a learned irrelevance effect in normal humans. This task embedded the logical structure of learned irrelevance within a computer-based task.…”

“…It is convenient to use these terms for simplicity in discussion, without necessarily implying that the participants' responses have been classically conditioned. Learning the color–rabbit (CS–US) association was significantly slowed in participants who had received prior uncorrelated exposure to the color CS and rabbit US (Myers et al).…”

“…A “magic word” was printed in large black lowercase letters inside a cartoon balloon above the magician. These magic words were taken from a set of 30 monosyllabic nonwords (Myers et al, in press); for each participant, 15 were used in Phase 1 and the remaining 15 were used in Phase 2. One of the Phase 1 magic words was randomly selected to be the signal word, W, which would predict the rabbit.…”