The effect of statistical learning on internal stimulus representations: predictable items are enhanced even when not predicted.
Statistical learning is the automatic and unconscious learning of environmental regularities and is a basic mechanism of learning in a variety of human perceptual and cognitive domains. Previous studies have mainly focused on the associative mechanisms of statistical learning. However, an unexplored question is whether the internal representations of individual stimuli are altered as their associations are learned. Using a temporal statistical learning paradigm, we examine this question across three experiments and find clear evidence that the internal representations of individual stimuli are differentially altered according to their degree of temporal predictability. These findings complement previous accounts of statistical learning and reveal an enriched mechanism of human learning, such that learning to associate items also enhances the representations of certain items relative to others.
Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, United States. Electronic address: bkbarakat@ucla.edu.
Brandon K
BK
Barakat
Aaron R
AR
Seitz
Ladan
L
Shams
D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001245:Association Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D004777:Environment; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D046709:Pattern Recognition, Physiological / Q000502:physiology; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time; D013997:Time Factors; D055815:Young Adult
Associative learning; Perceptual learning; Statistical learning; Stimulus saliency