Abstract

GUZMAN-DIAZ, Gelacio  and  SERRANO, Mario. Physicochemical versus linguistic properties in the acquisition and transfer of conditional discriminations by humans. Acta comport. [online]. 2013, vol.21, n.4, pp. 435-444. ISSN 0188-8145.

Groups of college students were exposed to a second-order matching-to-sample task using numbers as stimuli. For Group 1, matching relations were based on arithmetic operations (equality, addition and subtraction) whereas for Group 2 such relations were based on the font and color of numbers (identity, similarity in color and difference). For a third group, matching relations were redundantly based on arithmetic operations as well as font and color of numbers. Subsequently, all participants were exposed to test trials similar to those implemented in training for each group, as well as trials using geometric stimuli and identity, color, and shape similarities as matching relations. The acquisition of the conditional discrimination was slightly faster for Group 1 than for the other two groups. In test trials, the highest performance was observed for Group 3 and there were no robust differences between groups 1 and 2. The results are discussed in the context of interbehavioral psychology.

Keywords : Conditional discrimination; second-order matching-to-sample; physicochemical proprieties; linguistic proprieties; transfer; humans.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )