Recall of “Right” and “Wrong” Responses as a Function of Instructions for Intentional Learning and Task Familiarization

Abstract

Subjects (100 first-year students of both sexes from the Law School at Leuven, Belgium) selected one of several nonsense words as a “translation” of a real word and were told whether their choice was “right” or “wrong.” Subjects who expected to have the whole series of items a number of times until the correct translation for each word was completely learned (multiple-trial condition) recalled more “right” responses than subjects who expected a single second trial (two-trial condition). A preliminary exposure to a similar but shorter task had a different influence according to the two conditions: there was a decrease in recall of response in the multiple-trial condition but an increase in the two-trial condition. The data suggest that conflicting conclusions about the difference in recall between “right” and “wrong” responses are related to differences in the instructions for intentional learning.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Buchwald

A. M.

Variations in the apparent effects of “right” and “wrong” on subsequent behavior. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 1962, 1, 71–78.

Buchwald

A. M.

Effects of “right” and “wrong” on subsequent behavior: A new interpretation. Psychological Review, 1969, 76, 132–143.

D'Ydewalle

Time-perspective and learning in open and closed tasks. Psychologica Belgica, 1973, 13, 139–148.

D'Ydewalle

Eelen

Repetition and recall of “right” and “wrong” responses in incidental and intentional learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory, 1975, 1, 429–441.

Martin

De samenstelling van zes ekwivalente reeksen van “zinloze lettergrepen”—van het type medeklinker-klinker-medeklinker. Unpublished dissertation, Univer. of Leuven, 1966.

Mosberg

Response elimination in noncorrection paired-associates learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 1970, 83, 94–100.

Nuttin

Pleasure and reward in human motivation and learning. In Berlyne

D. E.

Madsen

K. B.

(Eds.), Pleasure, reward, preference. New York: Academic Press, 1973. Pp. 243–274.

Nuttin

Greenwald

A. G.

Reward and punishment in human learning. New York: Academic Press, 1968.

Spence

J. T.

Performance on a four-alternative task under different reinforcement combinations. Psychonomic Science, 1964, 1, 241–242.

10.

Spence

J. T.

The effects of verbal reinforcement combination on the performance of a four-alternative discrimination task. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 1966, 5, 421–428.

11.

Taylor

J. A.

The effects of anxiety level and psychological stress on verbal learning. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1958, 57, 55–60.