Automaticity Flashcards
- What are the three stages of skill development, according to Fitts and Posner (1967)? (1 point)
1: The Cognitive Stage
2: The Associative Stage
3: The Autonomous Stage
Describe the cognitive stage of skill development, according to Fitts and Posner (1967). (1 point)
Learners develop declarative knowledge – these facts are then rehearsed as they first perform the skills – it is slow and there are lots of errors due to high cognitive load
What is declarative knowledge? (1 point)
knowledge about facts and things; explicit knowledge we can report and of which we are consciously aware.
What is procedural knowledge? (1 point)
knowledge about how to do things. Usually (though not always) constructed from declarative knowledge. How to solve problems.
Describe the associative stage of skill development, according to Fitts and Posner (1967). (1 point)
Errors in initial understanding are eliminated
Connections between elements of the skill are strengthened
Procedures are created via proceedualization
There is a reduction in the cognitive load
Describe the autonomous stage of skill development, according to Fitts and Posner (1967). (1 point)
Skill becomes faster and free of errors
Procedures become automatic and require less cognitive load
Thus, should be easier as a result to do something else at the same time (dual task experiments are common to test for autonomy)
What is proceduralisation? (1 point)
The conversion of declarative knowledge into procedural knowledge
If the solution to a problem is encoded as procedural knowledge, people can just recall the solution from memory rather than have to work it out.
E.g. making an appropriate response to a given situation into a reflex.
E.g. relevant cues “popping out” of an environment without an effortful search
What are the parallels between Anderson’s concept of proceduralisation and Ericsson’s concept of mental representations? (1 point)
Proceduralization means you can solve the problem by just recognising the pattern: a move from computation to retrieval (see chess evidence).
Same with ericsson’s mental representations – skills become automatic with less errors due to less demand on cognitive resources
What verbal commentary evidence supports the idea of proceduralisation? (1 point)
Anderson’s 1982 geometry study: They had to answer geometry problems and think aloud while doing it.
After proceedualisation they were: 1. Faster; 2. No verbal rehearsal of the parts of the problem anymore 3. Application is in one step (the answer popped out to them)
What 3 things changed following proceduralisation during Anderson’s (1982) geometry studies? (1 point)
After proceeduarlistion during the triangle study: 1. Faster; 2. No verbal rehearsal of the postulate itself; 3. Application is in one step.
How did Logan (1988) define skill acquisition in terms of problem solving? (1 point)
Logan (1988) suggested that skill acquisition can be thought of as learning to recall solutions to problems that one has previously solved (i.e. proceduralization).
What did Logan and Klapp (1991) find in their experiment examining proceduralisation (methods, results, conclusions)? (2 points)
Method: Used “alpha-arithmetic” problems: e.g. what letter is three along from “F” in the alphabet? - They varied the number of letters participants had to count. Initially, people took much longer for higher numbers (because they were counting in their heads: bigger numbers meant a longer counting time). After proceduralization (i.e. they had memorized the answers), they took the same (short) time to do 5 as 2.
Conclusions: Proceeduralisaiton meant that the participants were able to chunk this process
Describe Jenkins et al.’s (1994) PET scanner study looking at proceduralisation (methods, results, conclusion). (2 points)
Method: asked participant to tap their fingers in given sequences (“ring, index, middle, little, index…”) while in a PET scanner.
Results: Early in learning, there is more activity in frontal areas of the brain (conscious thinking/planning). However, late in learning there is more activation in the hippocampus (associated with memory).
Conclusions: This is consistent with proceduralization taking place.
What experiment did Rowe and McKenna conduct to investigate automaticity in expert tennis players (methods, results, conclusions)? (3 points)
method: They used a dual-task paradigm: 1) they tested whether expert tennis players were faster than novices at anticipating a change in the direction of a tennis ball. they said to press a button as soon as they thought the ball would go across the court (as opposed to straight down the line) 2) at the same time generate a stream of random letters
results: they found that duel task was worse for both - however it affected experts significantly less (significant interaction)
What did Morgan & Pollack (1977) find out about the thought processes of expert marathon runners compared with novices? (1 point)
Experts still think: Expert marathon runners continually monitor their physiological state and the effectiveness of their running whereas novice runners think about things unrelated to running to minimize their pain (Morgan & Pollack, 1977).
