The relation between rate of learning and verbal, affective stimuli

Abstract

Psychologists have tended to neglect affect as an influential variable in verbal learning. This study investigated the question whether highly affective verbal stimuli are learned at a faster rate than neutral. The study consisted of two experiments, the first in a series of five, which examined the variables of affective intensity of stimulus words, order of presentation of word lists, and sex of Ss. Both experiments consisted of serial learning tasks, administered per experiment to 36 college students, using the anticipation method. Factorial analyses of variance were used to analyze the data from each experiment. The hypothesis for both experiments was that serial learning tasks of familiar, negative and positive affective words would be learned more rapidly than neutral words. In Exp. I, 3 lists, 9 words each, one list positive, one negative, and one of neutral words, counterbalanced for order of presentation, were administered to the 18 male and 18 female Ss. Words comprising each list were drawn from the Evaluation dimension of the Semantic Differential profiles developed by Heise (1965). The results from Exp. I showed that both positive and negative words were learned at a superior rate over neutral words (p<0.001). In Exp. I, a highly significant interaction (p<0.001) was found to exist between Lists and Order of presentation. The procedure for Exp. II was the same as Exp. I, except that Exp. II made use of a warm-up list in an attempt to eliminate the interaction. Therefore, each S in Exp. II received 4 lists, the first of which was the standard warm-up. In addition, Exp. II differed from Exp. I in that stimulus words were obtained from local ratings of 54 words made pre-experimentally by 80 different Ss. ...