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The Effect Of Overlearning And The Associative Value Of The Stimuli Upon Reversal Learning, Ralph Daniel Marken

All Master's Theses

In this experiment the relevance of the associative value of the stimuli in an overlearning reversal task will be examined as well as the persistence to respond to the former positive stimulus after reversal. That is, (1) Does the associative value of the stimuli have an effect upon the occurrence of the ORE, and (2) Do human Ss who have received overlearning tend to respond to the former positive stimulus upon reversal for more trials than do subjects receiving no overlearning as has been found for animals?

The Interaction Of External And Mediating Cues As A Function Of Type Of Stimulus Pretraining And Intralist Stimulus Similarity, David M. Del Castillo

Psychology ETDs

This experiment was design0d to test two implications derived from the hypotheses of acquired distinctiveness and equivalence of cues, and to determine the way in which similarity among external stimuli and distinctive vs. common mediating cues, interact to affect the learned distinctiveness or equivalence of cues. It was predicted from the acquired distinctiveness hypotheses that relative]y greater positive transfer would result when distinctive mediating responses were attached to highly similar stimuli than when these same responses were attached to stimuli that were initially low in similarity. A parallel prediction, derived from the acquired equivalence hypothesis, was that negative transfer would …

Delayed Auditory Feedback And Retention Testing Time, Wayne K. Miller

All Master's Theses

There have been many studies exploring variables that contribute to the appearance of the phenomenon, but strikingly few studies attempting to relate DAF to learning. Since sensory feed back is very important to behavior and especially learning, it would seem that the DAF phenomenon could yield some significant information for learning.

The Relative Efficiency Of Auditory (Social) Reinforcement Vs. Food Reinforcement With The Squirrel Monkey (Saimiri Sciureus) In An Operant Situation, David R. Mcmurray

All Master's Theses

Research using non-deprivation and sensory or food reinforcement has received little attention to the present time. It is possible that, at least in the laboratory, sensory reinforcement under non- deprived conditions may be a much more economical and efficient reinforcer than food reinforcement under deprived conditions, which is traditionally used.

Input And Output Speed Components Of Learning-To-Learn, Jon G. Rogers

Psychology ETDs

Input and output speed were investigated to determine if they were components of learning-to-learn. The major criterion used to distinguish learning-to-learn from warm-up has generally (e.g. Hamilton, 1950) been the temporal persistence of learning-to-learn phenomena.

Sixteen paired-associate practice lists consisting of high frequency words were presented for two trials to four acquisition groups in two sessions a day apart. Each acquisition group received input at either a fast (2 sec.) or slow (5 sec.) rate. Input speed (i.e., study interval) was the time the stimulus-response unit appeared. Subjects were required to respond to a light occurring at either a fast …

The Effect Of Associative Factors On Generalization Gradients In Shape Recognition, Robert L. Feuge

Psychology ETDs

It is generally observed that positive transfer will ensue from an A-B, A-C paradigm, provided the responses, B and C, are sufficiently different so as to minimize interlist confusion (Arnoult, 1957; Ellis, 1965). This paradigm, known as the "stimulus predifferentiation paradigm", produces positive transfer presumably because pretraining on relevant stimuli (A) differentiates the stimuli, making them less "confusing" or more "distinctive". This enhanced distinctiveness increases the ease with which new responses may be attached to the stimuli.

An Experiment To Determine If Teacher Preparation In A Small High School Can Be Reduced By Alternating Class Scheduling, John Carl Tuft

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this study was to determine if by alternating certain classes biennially the number of different teaching preparations could be reduced thus decreasing the teachers' load. The study also attempted to ascertain the effect this type of scheduling had upon the attitudes of teachers and students toward these classes. A further attempt was made to determine if mixing students from two grade levels resulted in the younger student being penalized with respect to his cumulative grade point average.

The significant conclusions that can be drawn from the results follow:

Teachers, generally, thought well of the project and desires …

Control Of Behavior Through Reinforcement Menus, Gary Lyndle Holt

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Reinforcement menus were used to change response probabilities while maintaining control over two ''trainable," female, mentally retarded children.

An empirically determined reinforcement menu representing high probability behaviors, five for S₁ and four for S₂, was used in a contingency management system. Instructions were given concerning the contingencies for obtaining reinforcement. Subjects were allowed the opportunity to engage in a high probability behavior only after successful completion of fixed units of reading or arithmetic tasks. After stable performance was established, four additional menus were prepared to approximate in increasing degree, low probability behavior. Measurements were taken of task …

Guarded And Unguarded Responses To Sentence Completion Tests Among Normal Adolescents And Juvenile Delinquents, Mohammed K. Fazel

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study was designed to test the responses of a group of juvenile delinquests and a group of normal adolescents to a sentence completion test. The test used was a modified form of Sack's Sentence Completion test in two forms--form A, first person stems and form B, third person stems. The hypothesis to be tested were (1) people project more in the third person, (2) the normal projects more, and (3) there would be no difference in projection on neutral items. The results bear out the three hypothesis. The sex scale, however, was an exception. This may be due to …

The Relationship Of Delinquent Types In An Industrial School Setting To Personality-Motivation Profiles, Lester A. Carlson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The author serves as Director of Education of the Utah State Industrial School, a school charged with the responsibility for the custody and treatment of delinquents committed to its care from the juvenile courts of the state. For many years he has been concerned about the personality structure of the children committed to the care of the Industrial School. He became particularly interested in the possibility that there is a definable relationship between types of delinquent acts and personality-motivation profiles. Further motivation was given to this interest when he received an answer to some correspondence from a colleague of Dr. …

A Comparison Of Two Non-Verbal Intelligence Tests As Predictors Of Academic Success Of Navajo Students, Stanford S. Larson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study was a search for a valid and reliable tool for the measurement and appraisal of the Navajo student at Intermountain School whose cultural and bilingual background make many highly verbal tests untrustworthy. The two tests chosen for the study were the Chicago Non-verbal Examination and the Cattell Institute for Personality and Ability Testing Culture Free Test. It was assumed that these tests would call attention to students who had good intellectual ability but were below standard in reading and verbal development and had been overlooked because of their lack of verbal fluency.

The two tests were administered to …

A Study Of The Relationship Between Anxiety, Manifest Needs, And Creativity In Upward Bound Students, Neal A. Davidson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Previous investigators have indicated that low socio-economic students have difficulty experiencing success on tests heavily loaded with verbal material. Differences in personality characteristics between students of high and low creativity have also been found. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the influence of manifest needs and anxiety on creative thinking.

The Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale, which determines anxiety level, the Edwards Personal Preference Schedule, which measures manifest needs, and the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking, which provides an index of creativity were administered to Spanish-American, Anglo-American, Negro, and Navaho high school students, who constituted the 1967 Upward …

The Relationship Between Food And Fear, Henry Tjahjono

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

Traditionally, the procedure of feeding an organism in a fear-producting situation has been viewed as having a fear-reducing effect, called counterconditioning. English and English define counterconditioning as the procedure of conditioning a second and conflicting response to a conditioned stimulus that is not simultaneously being reinforced. Fear is reduced by conditioning to the fear-producing stimuli the incompatible emotional responses associated with eating (e.g.--Miller, 1951)

The strength of fear was illustrated by Miller in 1951. He found that albino rats, trained to run down an alley to secure food at a distinctive place and motivated by a 46-hour hunger, would pull …

Psychotherapy: Therapist Goals, Patient Expectations And Patient Satisfaction, James A. Hill

Dissertations

No abstract provided.

A Study Of Faculty Ratings In A Minor Seminary, John W. Mccloskey

Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Predicting Scholastic Success In A School Of Law, Louida Dare Murray

Psychology ETDs

Professional training is a costly undertaking both for the individual being trained and the institution that trains him. Each year, all over the United States, many young men and women embark upon their professional training as potential lawyers; each year many of these same young men and women withdraw from the law program. Some of the students admittedly withdraw because they ascertain that they will not be able to complete their law training due to inability to cope with the material which they are expected to master. Others, fully capable of dealing with the material in the intellectual sense, find …

Effects Of Delay Of Reinforcement On Problem Solving Behavior, Verne R. Bacharach

All Master's Theses

This study was designed to investigate the effects of delay of feedback in a programmed instruction task, retention, and subsequent problem solving behavior. The instructional material in symbolic logic was specifically presented in such a way as to introduce certain basic logical concepts and mechanical procedures in a logically coherent body of knowledge.

Tester's Race Influence On Hostility Manifestations On The D-A-P'S Of Negro Culturally Deprived Children, Doris Diamant Machtinger

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

The main purpose of this study is to determine the effects of the race of an examiner upon hostility indicated through drawings of a person made by culturally deprived Negro children. Spontaneous drawings by children have been long suspected of holding a key to the psychology of child development. The history of psychological research on children's drawings has been reviewed by Harris (1963). He found that as early as 1885 Ebenezer Cooke published an article on children's drawings in which he described the successive stages of development as he observed them. Between 1885 and 1908 many studies were conducted on …

A Comparison Of Estimates Of Relative Frequency Vs. Subjective Probability, Duncan Muir Mcquarrie

All Master's Theses

The purpose of this study is to extend the investigation of the general area of subjective probability by exploring three methods of asking for estimates. Inasmuch as this area has not been a major focus of interest for experimental studies, a brief review of the kinds of studies emanating from subjective probability notions will be given.

Revision Of Subjective Probabilities Under A Bayesian Model, Gary A. Sterner

All Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to examine the degree to which subjective probability judgments conform to the Bayesian model of mathematical probability theory; more specifically, the degree to which subjective probability estimates for intersections of events approximate the product of the subjective judgments for component events.

The Effect Of Verbal And Visual Mnemonic Devices On The Paired Associate Learning Of An Aged Population, Franklin Peter Knill

Master's Theses

The literature on aging is abundant with studies using a variety of tasks indicating that there is a decline in learning with increasing age.

Subjects were presented pairs of words accompanied by a black and white sketch that contained both words

In a further attempt to study more directly the effects of visual vs. verbal mediators, a second condition was included where subjects were presented pairs of words accompanied by a phrase that contained both of the words.

The following bypotheaee were postulated:

1. Performance of younger subjects will be superior to old ones over all conditions.

2. Performance will …

Stimulus Coding Ability And Stimulus Predifferentiation, Larry E. Homan

Psychology ETDs

Many recent studies of the effects of past-experience variables on perception have organized in the effort to provide tests of the enrichment and differentiation accounts of these effects. The enrichment position. Usually stated in terms of acquired distinctiveness of cues (Goss, 1955; Miller and Dollard, 1941), holds that learning a distinctive responses to a stimulus will result in the addition to that stimulus of a distinctive response-produced cue. In turn, the newly “enriched” stimulus is less similar to related stimuli than before such learning occurred. Moreover, this reduction in similarity is conceptualized as a reduction in generalization among the list …

Characteristics Of The D 48 Test When Used At The College Level, Maynard E. Boyd

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Group tests of mental ability are used far more extensively than individual tests in selection and classification procedures where large numbers of individuals are concerned. Historically, group testing was developed in America during the time of the First World War, in 1917, to meet the practical demands of selection and classification of the overwhelming number of recruits. One of the first men to experiment with these group measurement techniques was Arthur S . Otis.

The Effect Of Neurological Training On Reading Retardation, Mary Julia Masterman

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Creativity And Deviant Set Responding In Third Grade Children, Elizabeth S. Waller

Master's Theses

This study will be an investigation of the relationship between test scores of creativity, according to the Minnesota Tests of Creative Thinking (Torrance, 1960), and teacher ratings of creativity for third grade children. The hypothesis that highly creative individuals tend to give deviant response patterns on the PRT will also be tested.

Post-Discrimination Generalization In Human Subjects Of Two Different Ages, Jeffrey S. Landau

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

No abstract provided.

Brentano's Empirical Psychology: An English Translation With An Evaluation Of Its Influence Upon Contemporary Scientific Psychology Volume 1, Antos C. Rancurello

Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Brentano's Empirical Psychology: An English Translation With An Evaluation Of Its Influence Upon Contemporary Scientific Psychology Volume 2, Antos C. Rancurello

Dissertations

No abstract provided.

An Investigation Of The Effects Of Three Levels Of Stress On The Operant Conditioning Of Verbal Behavior, Bruce N. Christensen

Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Pupillary Size And Its Relationship To The Problem Solving Process, Raymond M. Daly

Dissertations

No abstract provided.