title: Contextual control of attentional allocation in human discrimination learning.
abstract: In 3 human predictive learning experiments, we investigated whether the allocation of attention can come under the control of contextual stimuli. In each experiment, participants initially received a conditional discrimination for which one set of cues was trained as relevant in Context 1 and irrelevant in Context 2, and another set was relevant in Context 2 and irrelevant in Context 1. For Experiments 1 and 2, we observed that a second discrimination based on cues that had previously been trained as relevant in Context 1 during the conditional discrimination was acquired more rapidly in Context 1 than in Context 2. Experiment 3 revealed a similar outcome when new stimuli from the original dimensions were used in the test stage. Our results support the view that the associability of a stimulus can be controlled by the stimuli that accompany it.
authors.affiliation: Philipps—Universität Marburg, Germany. uengoer@staff.uni-marburg.de
authors.forename: Metin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Uengoer
authors.forename: Harald
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Lachnit
authors.forename: Anja
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lotz
authors.forename: Stephan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Koenig
authors.forename: John M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Pearce
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D003213:Conditioning, Psychological / Q000502:physiology*; D003463:Cues; D004193:Discrimination Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D055815:Young Adult