Further Evidence for the Mediating role of Learning in the "Mere Exposure" Phenomenon.
The effect of the position of a nonsense word within a serial list on the affective meaning attributed the word was studied. A one-way analysis of variance conducted on the rated goodness measures provided by 32 female Ss shows that serial position had a significant effect (p < .01). The first and last serial positions were rated to have the most positive meanings, with the data for the remaining positions corresponding to the serial position curve typically found for recall data. A trend analysis reveals that the only significant component is the quadratic trend (p < .01). It is concluded that the data support the hypothesis that learning mediates the well-documented relationship between frequency of exposure and affect.
a Western Illinois University , USA.
Gene F
GF
Smith