title: Thirty-something categorization results explained: selective attention, eyetracking, and models of category learning.
abstract: An eyetracking study testing D. L. Medin and M. M. Schaffer's (1978) 5-4 category structure was conducted. Over 30 studies have shown that the exemplar-based generalized context model (GCM) usually provides a better quantitative account of 5-4 learning data as compared with the prototype model. However, J. D. Smith and J. P. Minda (2000) argued that the GCM is a psychologically implausible account of 5-4 learning because it implies suboptimal attention weights. To test this claim, the authors recorded undergraduates' eye movements while the students learned the 5-4 category structure. Eye fixations matched the attention weights estimated by the GCM but not those of the prototype model. This result confirms that the GCM is a realistic model of the processes involved in learning the 5-4 structure and that learners do not always optimize attention, as commonly supposed. The conditions under which learners are likely to optimize attention during category learning are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of PsychologyNew York University, New York, NY 10003, USA. bob.rehder@nyu.edu
authors.forename: Bob
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Rehder
authors.forename: Aaron B
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Hoffman
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D005133:Eye Movements; D005403:Fixation, Ocular; D006801:Humans; D007858:Learning