Running head: Implicit sequence learning ABSTRACT Can we learn without awareness? Although this issue has been extensively explored through studies of implicit learning, there is currently no agreement about the extent to which knowledge can be acquired and projected onto performance in an unconscious way. The controversy, like that surrounding implicit memory, seems to be at least in part attributable to unquestioned acceptance of the unrealistic assumption that tasks are process-pure, that is, that a given task exclusively involves either implicit (...) or explicit knowledge. (shrink)

This paper uses the Process Dissociation Procedure to explore whether people can acquire unconscious knowledge in the serial reaction time task [Destrebecqz, A., & Cleeremans, A. . Can sequence learning be implicit? New evidence with the Process Dissociation Procedure. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 8, 343–350; Wilkinson, L., & Shanks, D. R. . Intentional control and implicit sequence learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 30, 354–369]. Experiment 1 showed that people generated legal sequences above baseline levels under exclusion (...) instructions. Reward moved exclusion performance towards baseline, indicating that the extent of motivation in the test phase influenced the expression of unconscious knowledge. Experiments 2 and 3 revealed that even with reward, adding noise to the sequences or shortening training led to above-baseline exclusion performance, suggesting that task difficulty and the amount of training also affected the expression of unconscious knowledge. The results help resolve some current debates about the role of conscious awareness in sequence learning. (shrink)

Consciousness can be measured in various ways, but different measures often yield different conclusions about the extent to which awareness relates to performance. Here, we compare five different subjective measures of awareness in the context of an artificial grammar learning task. Participants expressed their subjective awareness of rules using one of five different scales: confidence ratings , post-decision wagering , feeling of warmth , rule awareness , and continuous scale . All scales were equally sensitive to conscious knowledge. PDW, however, (...) was affected by risk aversion, and both RAS and SDS applied different minimal criteria for rule awareness. CR seems to capture the largest range of consciousness, but failed to indicate unconscious knowledge with the guessing criterion. We close by discussing the theoretical implications of scale sensitivity and propose that CR’s unique features enable a finer assessment of subjective states of awareness. (shrink)

The results of four experiments provide evidence for controlled processing in the absence of awareness. Participants identified the colour of a neutral distracter word. Each of four words was presented in one of the four colours 75% of the time or 50% of the time . Colour identification was faster when the words appeared in the colour they were most often presented in relative to when they appeared in another colour, even for participants who were subjectively unaware of any contingencies (...) between the words and the colours. An analysis of sequence effects showed that participants who were unaware of the relation between distracter words and colours nonetheless controlled the impact of the word on performance depending on the nature of the previous trial. A block analysis of contingency-unaware participants revealed that contingencies were learned rapidly in the first block of trials. Experiment 3 showed that the contingency effect does not depend on the level of awareness, thus ruling out explicit strategy accounts. Finally, Experiment 4 showed that the contingency effect results from behavioural control and not from semantic association or stimulus familiarity. These results thus provide evidence for implicit control. (shrink)

It is commonly held that implicit learning is based largely on familiarity. It is also commonly held that familiarity is not affected by intentions. It follows that people should not be able to use familiarity to distinguish strings from two different implicitly learned grammars. In two experiments, subjects were trained on two grammars and then asked to endorse strings from only one of the grammars. Subjects also rated how familiar each string felt and reported whether or not they used familiarity (...) to make their grammaticality judgment. We found subjects could endorse the strings of just one grammar and ignore the strings from the other. Importantly, when subjects said they were using familiarity, the rated familiarity for test strings consistent with their chosen grammar was greater than that for strings from the other grammar. Familiarity, subjectively defined, is sensitive to intentions and can play a key role in strategic control. (shrink)

We argue performance in the serial reaction time task is associated with gradations of awareness that provide examples of fringe consciousness [Mangan, B. . Taking phenomenology seriously: the “fringe” and its implications for cognitive research. Consciousness and Cognition, 2, 89–108, Mangan, B. . The conscious “fringe”: Bringing William James up to date. In B. J. Baars, W. P. Banks & J. B. Newman , Essential sources in the scientific study of consciousness . Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.], and address limitations (...) of the traditional SRT procedure, including criticism of exclusion generation tasks. Two experiments are conducted with a modified SRT procedure where irrelevant stimulus attributes obscure the sequence rule. Our modified paradigm, which includes a novel exclusion task, makes it easier to demonstrate a previously controversial influence of response stimulus interval on awareness. It also allows identification of participants showing fringe consciousness rather than explicit sequence knowledge, as reflected by dissociations between different awareness measures. The NEO-PI-R variable Openness to Feelings influenced the diversity of subjective feelings reported during two awareness measures, but not the degree of learning and awareness as previously found with traditional SRT tasks [Norman, E., Price, M. C., & Duff, S. C. . Fringe consciousness in sequence learning: the influence of individual differences. Consciousness and Cognition, 15, 723–760.]. This suggests possible distinctions between two components of fringe consciousness. (shrink)

This paper investigates the conscious status of both the knowledge that an item is legal and the knowledge of why it is legal in sequence learning. We compared ability to control use of knowledge with stated awareness of the knowledge as measures of the conscious status of knowledge. Experiment 1 showed that when people could control use of judgment knowledge they were indeed conscious of having that knowledge according to their own statements. Yet Experiment 2 showed that people could exert (...) such control over the use of judgment knowledge when claiming they had no structural knowledge: i.e. conscious judgment knowledge could be based on unconscious structural knowledge. Further implicit learning research should be clear over whether judgment or structural knowledge is claimed to be unconscious as the two dissociate in sequence learning. (shrink)

We first describe how the concept of “fringe consciousness” can characterise gradations of consciousness between the extremes of implicit and explicit learning. We then show that the NEO-PI-R personality measure of openness to feelings, chosen to reflect the ability to introspect on fringe feelings, influences both learning and awareness in the serial reaction time task under conditions that have previously been associated with implicit learning . This provides empirical evidence for the proposed phenomenology and functional role of fringe consciousness in (...) so-called implicit learning paradigms . Introducing an individual difference variable also helped to identify possible limitations of the exclusion task as a measure of conscious sequence knowledge. Further exploration of individual differences in fringe awareness may help to avoid polarity in the implicit learning debate, and to resolve apparent inconsistencies between previous SRT studies. (shrink)

In response to concerns with existing procedures for measuring strategic control over implicit knowledge in artificial grammar learning , we introduce a more stringent measurement procedure. After two separate training blocks which each consisted of letter strings derived from a different grammar, participants either judged the grammaticality of novel letter strings with respect to only one of these two grammars , or had the target grammar varying randomly from trial to trial which required a higher degree of conscious flexible control. (...) Random variation in the colour and font of letters was introduced to disguise the nature of the rule and reduce explicit learning. Strategic control was observed both in the pure-block and mixed-block conditions, and even among participants who did not realise the rule was based on letter identity. This indicated detailed strategic control in the absence of explicit learning. (shrink)

Through the use of double task conditions, the sequence learning (SL) paradigm offers unique opportunities to study the relationships between learning and attention. In their original study, Nissen & Bullemer (1987) argued that a secondary tone-counting task prevents SL because it exhausts participants’ attentional resources. Other authors have instead suggested that the detrimental effects of tone-counting are due to scheduling conflicts between performing the main and secondary tasks rather than to attentional load. Frensch & Miner (1994), for instance, suggested that (...) the secondary task impairs sequence learning because it lengthens the response-to-stimulus interval (RSI) and hence makes it less likely for relevant contingencies to be represented together in short-term memory, — a condition for learning. Stadler (1995), on the other hand, argued that the secondary task introduces variability in the RSI and disrupts the organization of the sequence into chunks. Further, according to Willingham, Greenberg & Cannon Thomas (1997) manipulation of the RSI influences performance but not sequence learning.. (shrink)