Effects of perceptual training of sequenced line movements.

Abstract

The effects of consistent training on sequential stimuli were examined in a series of six experiments. A stimulus consisted of three line segments which occurred one after another such that each line segment’s orientation and position on the visual channel could be different from the other lines of the stimulus. Subjects practiced these sequences in search and detection tasks for 17 h in both varied mapping (VM) and consistent mapping (CM) conditions. Subsequent experiments compared performance on the two practice conditions with results of previous experiments which used letters and digits as stimuli. The results indicated that the CM stimuli required less attention than the VM stimuli. The differences seen, however, were smaller than those found in previous experiments with letter and digit stimuli. Large differences between the CM and VM groups were found when the individual line segments of the sequential stimuli were manipulated. Shortening and lengthening the line durations had little effect on CM stimuli and large effects on VM stimuli. When the line segments were overlapped with each other, subjects indicated, in a subjective ratings task, that the CM and VM stimuli were perceived differently. Finally, presenting rotated versions of the trained stimuli destroyed any performance advantages the CM stimuli had over the VM stimuli.