Implicit learning: An analysis of the form and structure of a body of tacit knowledge

Abstract

Subjects learned implicitly the underlying structure of an artificial language by memorizing a set of representative exemplars from the language. The form and structure of their resulting knowledge of the language was evaluated and analyzed over a four day period by several procedures: (a) solving anagrams from the language, (b) determining the well-formedness of novel letter strings, and (c) providing detailed introspective reports. Several important implications about implicit acquisition of a novel complex system emerged. First, the memorial representation of a structured system is acquired through the dual operations of a differentiation-like process based upon relational invariances and a configurational process based upon overall structure. Second, the form of tacit knowledge is an abstract representation of the intrinsic structure of the stimulus field. Third, while the ability to make explicit what is known implicitly increases with performance levels, the conscious apprehension of structure always lags behind what is known unconsciously.