Transfer of sensory-integration training.

Abstract

96 university students participated in one of six treatments to assess whether training to make cross-modal or intramodal matches of one linear-movement distance would transfer to other distances. Three groups received unimodal training (vision, audition, or kinesthesis) and three groups received multimodal training (all combinations of vision, audition, and kinesthesis) to make kinesthetic matches of one common linear-movement distance. All subjects were subsequently tested on kinesthetic matches of novel distances both shorter and longer than the training distance. A multivariate analysis of variance and Bonferroni contrasts indicated that cross-modal matching was enhanced by multimodal experience but only for distances shorter than the training distance. It was speculated that transferring to distances shorter than a training distance might involve processes different from those used to transfer to distances longer than the training distance.