Effect of Three Types of Feedback on Concept Formation in Chronic Schizophrenics

Abstract

An attempt was made to measure the differential effects of reward, “wrong,” and white noise, presented singly and in all possible combinations, on the performance of chronic schizophrenics on a concept formation task. Wrong was found to be the most effective, white noise next, and reward the least effective. Feedback presented in pairs proved to be more effective than when presented singly. The results tended to support the conclusions that: (a) Learning of schizophrenics is influenced more by feedback for errors than by reward following correct responses. (b) A combination of cues is more effective than single cues. The findings were discussed in relation to previous theoretical explanations of psychological deficit in schizophrenics.

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