The Relationships Between Psychometric Intelligence and Learning in an Explicit and an Implicit Task
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Copyright 1997 by the American Psychological Association, Inc. Learning, Memory, and Cognition 0278-7393/97/$3.00 1997, Vol. 23, No. 1,239-245 The Relationships Between Psychometric Intelligence and Learning in an Explicit and an Implicit Task Peter McGeorge, J. R. Crawford, and S. W. Kelly University of Aberdeen An experiment is reported examining the relation of implicit grammar learning and series completion tasks to a standard measure of psychometric intelligence, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale---Revised (WAIS-R; D. Wechsler, 1981). The results replicate and extend an earlier study by A. S. Reber, F. F. Walkenfeld, and R. Hernstadt (1991) and provide the following support for the differences between explicit and implicit tasks: (a) The implicit task was less strongly related to Full Scale IQ, and (b) the implicit task appeared to be independent of age. The implicit and explicit tasks exhibited a quite different pattern of relations to the factors known to underlie WAIS-R performance. Although both tasks showed significant links with a Perceptual Organization factor, only the series completion task showed a significant link with the Attention factor. The distinction between explicit and implicit processes or principles derived from evolutionary biology, Reber argued systems represents one of the most active areas of research that these earlier emerging functions will be the foundations in cognitive psychology (for reviews, see Reber, 1989, 1993; on which later developing conscious functions will have Roediger & McDermott, 1993). One aspect of this research been built. In addition, on the basis of these operating is the distinction, first articulated by Reber (1967), between principles, Reber derived five important predictions concern- explicit and implicit learning. Implicit learning has been ing the nature of implicit processes; these are as follows: characterized as the process through which knowledge Implicit processes should be more robust in the face of concerning complex rule-governed environments is ac- psychiatric and neurological insults; implicit processes should quired independent of awareness of both the process and the display tighter distributions in the population with fewer products of acquisition (Reber, 1989). Implicit learning has individual differences; implicit functions should show little been reported in a wide range of experimental settings, for relationship to performance on standard measures of cogni- example, the control of dynamic systems (e.g., Berry & tive capability, such as psychometric tests of intelligence; Broadbent, 1984; McGeorge & Burton, 1989; Stanley, implicit processes should show a commonality across spe- Mathews, Buss, & Kotler-Cope, 1989), the acquisition of cies; and implicit processes should be little affected by age covariances between personality and facial characteristics and developmental level. (e.g., Lewicki, 1986), the acquisition of complex procedural To test the assumptions that implicit learning is indepen- information (e.g., Lewicki, Czyzewska, & Hoffman, 1987), dent of IQ and has a lower variability in the population, the learning of invariances (McGeorge & Burton, 1990), and Reber, Walkenfeld, and Hernstadt (1991) examined the the learning of artificial grammars (e.g., Mathews et al., relationships between performance on a standard intelli- 1989; Reber, 1967, 1969). Explicit learning is seen as the gence test (a four-subtest short form of the Wechsler Adult converse of this with awareness of both the processes and Intelligence Scale--Revised, WAIS-R; Wechsler, 1981), the products being its central aspects. performance on a task thought to favor an explicit mode of Recently, Reber (1993) argued that the study of implicit learning, and performance on a task thought to favor an processes should be seen from an evolutionary perspective. implicit mode of learning. The explicit learning task was In evolutionary terms, consciousness is a relatively recent based on series solution problems. In this task, participants phenomenon and one predated by many sophisticated percep- are presented with ordered sequences of letters. Each tual and cognitive functions. Invoking so-called operating sequence represents a pattern, and the task of the participant is to discover what the pattern is in order to predict the subsequent letter or letters of the sequence, For example, Peter McGeorge, J. R. Crawford, and S. W. Kelly, Department of participants might be given the sequence ~a3ACAa~A and Psychology, University of Aberdeen, Old Aberdeen, Scotland. asked to predict the next letter of the sequence (in this case S. W. Kelly is now at the Department of Psychology, University of E). In Reber et al.'s (1991) study, the selection of the next Glasgow, Glasgow, Scotland. letter in the sequence was based on a two-alternative forced Preparation of this article was supported by Grant R000234247 from the Economic and Social Research Council. We thank Pat choice procedure. The implicit learning task was based on a Chalmers for her help in collecting the data. finite state grammar. Permissible (grammatical) combina- Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to tions of letters were specified by pathways within a state Peter McGeorge, Department of Psychology, University of Aber- transition diagram. Combinations of letters that violated deen, Old Aberdeen, AB9 2UB Scotland. Electronic mall may be these pathways were referred to as nongrammatical. Follow-" sent via Internet to psy 144 @abdn.uk.ac. ing an incidental learning phase, often disguised as a simple 239 240 OBSERVATIONS memory task, participants were tested on their ability to Concentration factor (e.g., Crawford, Allan, Stephen, Parker, distinguish between well-formed or grammatical strings and & Besson, 1989; Kaufman, 1990; Le,ckliter, Matarazzo, & nongrammatical strings (well-formedness test). Silverstein, 1986). The Attention--Concentration factor is of The results of Reber et al.'s (1991) study indicated that particular interest as low scores on the subtests that serve as although IQ was significantly correlated with the series indicators of this factor (Digit Span and Arithmetic) are solution task, accounting for nearly 50% of the variance in often associated with individuals from a range of special performance, the correlation between IQ and performance populations with problems in attention, including individu- on the well-formedness test was not significant and ac- als with reading problems and learning disabilities, alcohol- counted only for just over 6% of the variance in perfor- ism, brain injuries, and Huntington's disease (Kaufman, mance. In addition and as predicted, the distribution of 1990). Reber (1993) has argued that these populations show scores from the explicit task showed much higher variance levels of implicit learning equivalent to the normal popula- than the scores obtained for the implicit task. Together these tion. This suggests that performance on the implicit task findings provide support for the contentions, derived from shows little relationship to the Attention-Concentration the phyletic primacy of implicit processes, that traditional factor. psychometric tests do not measure the same cognitive So, although the correlation between an implicit function components as are required by implicit tests (such as the and IQ may always be significantly lower than the correla- well-formedness test) and that implicit tasks show fewer tion between tQ and the corresponding explicit function-- individual differences than equivalent explicit tasks. and indeed it may not show a significant correlation with As Reber (1993) pointed out, Rozin (1976) has argued Full Scale IQ--an examination of the relationships between that the development of intelligence should also be seen these learning functions and the various factors thought to from an evolutionary perspective. Rozin argued that evolu- underlie the WAIS-R may provide significant insights into tion will give rise to a series of adaptive specializations. the cognitive functions important in the two learning tasks. These are highly modular processes, which are initially Reber et al. (1991) used a short form of the WAIS-R, inaccessible to other processes and are often hardwired. comprising 4 of the 11 subtests, and so were unable to Together this collection of hardwired, limited-access machin- explore the relationships between the learning tasks and the ery forms the cognitive unconscious (Rozin, 1976). Part of factors underlying the WAIS-R. Using a full-length WAIS-R the evolution of more intelligent organisms would be to establish Full Scale IQ would allow these relationships to increased communication between these unconscious modu- be tested. lar processes. This would result in the development of the Finally, there are a number of methodological issues conscious executive controls that mark intelligent behavior. raised by Reber et al.'s (1991) study that complicate the Within this framework, intelligence can be conceived as a interpretation of their results. The foremost of these issues hierarchy in which these encapsulated modular processes relates to the size and nature of the sample on which the become available to more and more systems (Rozin, 1976). analysis was based. Reber et al. used a relatively small Under such hierarchical conditions, traditional psychometric sample of participants (N = 20), all of whom were students. tests such as the WAIS-R will, in measuring this conscious The mean IQ for the