Screening cervical smears.
A plausible explanation is offered why an experienced pathologist engaged in the screening of cervical smears should have issued a large number of false-negative diagnoses. The explanation centres on the interactions which occur between successive judgements when a sequence of similar stimuli are inspected. Briefly, those interactions have the character of an assimilation of each judgement to its predecessor, and the resultant process is capable of 'running away'. A procedure is suggested, involving the provision of immediate knowledge of results for a small proportion of the smears inspected, which would prevent such systematic misdiagnoses from recurring in the future.
University of Cambridge, Department of Experimental Psychology, Cambridge, UK.
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Laming
D001288:Attention; D003951:Diagnostic Errors; D005188:False Negative Reactions; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008403:Mass Screening / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011336:Probability; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D002583:Uterine Cervical Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology / Q000517:prevention & control; D014626:Vaginal Smears / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*