The Heuristic Power of Oppositionality within and Between Paired-Associate Units
Alec Ulasevich, Joseph F. Rychlak · The Journal of General Psychology · 1994
Two experiments are presented in which the role of oppositionality as a heuristic aid to paired-associate (PA) learning was examined. In the first experiment, subjects initially formed PA units by proffering antonyms, synonyms, and same-first-letter words to a cue word. Subsequently, both antonyms and synonyms were freely recalled more readily than were same-first-letter words (p < .001). Cued recall favored synonyms over both other conditions (p < .05). In the second experiment, subjects learned related PA units in which the stimulus terms bore either an antonymous or a synonymous relationship. Fifty percent fewer association errors occurred when the PA stimuli were antonyms than when they were synonyms (p < .05). Thus, oppositionality reflected heuristic properties both within and between PA units. Results are discussed in terms of network, feature-matching, and predicational modeling.