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Daniel R. Little - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Survivor interaction contrasts for errored response times: Non-parametric contrasts for serial and parallel systems
2020Co-Authors: Haiyuan Yang, Daniel R. Little, Ami Eidels, James T. TownsendAbstract:Systems Factorial Technology (SFT) is a theoretically-derived methodology that allows for strong inferences to be made about the underlying processing Architecture (e.g., whether processing occurs in a pooled, coactive fashion or independently, in serial or in parallel). Measures of Mental Architecture using SFT have been restricted to the use of error-free response times. In this paper, through formal proofs and demonstrations, we extended the measure of Architecture, the survivor interaction contrast (SIC), to response times conditioned on whether they are correct or incorrect. We show that so long as an ordering relation (between stimulus conditions of different difficulty) is preserved, unique conditional SIC predictions are found for several classes of processing models. We further prove that this ordering relation holds for the popular Wiener diffusion model for both correct and error RTs but fails under some instantiations of a Poisson counter model.
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An examination of parallel versus coactive processing accounts of redundant-target audiovisual signal processing
Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 2018Co-Authors: Cheng-ta Yang, Nicholas Altieri, Daniel R. LittleAbstract:Abstract We ask whether auditory and visual signals are processed using a consistent Mental Architecture across variable experiMental designs. It is well-known that in an auditory-visual task requiring divided attention, responses are often faster for redundant audiovisual targets compared to unisensory targets. Importantly, these redundant-target effects can theoretically be explained by several different Mental Architectures, which are explored in this paper. These include: independent-race models, parallel interactive models, and coactive models. Earlier results, especially redundant-target processing times which are faster than predicted by the race-model inequality (Miller, 1982), implicated coactivation as a necessary explanation of redundant-target processing. However, this explanation has been recently challenged by demonstrating that violations of the race-model inequality can be explained by violations of the context invariance assumption underlying the race-model inequality (Otto & Mamassian, 2012). We utilized Systems Factorial Technology (Townsend & Nozawa, 1995), regarded as a standard diagnostic tool for inferences about Mental Architecture, to study redundant-target audiovisual processing. Three experiments were carried out in: a discrimination task (Experiment 1), a simultaneous perceptual matching task (Experiment 2), and a delayed matching task (Experiment 3). The results provide a key set of benchmarks to which we apply several simulations that are consistent with the context invariance explanation not only of the race-model inequality but also of capacity and Architecture.
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Logical-Rule Based Models of Categorization: Using Systems Factorial Technology to Understand Feature and Dimensional Processing
Systems Factorial Technology, 2017Co-Authors: David W. Griffiths, Anthea G. Blunden, Daniel R. LittleAbstract:Abstract This chapter will review the development of a parametric modeling framework and methodology based on the principles set forth by Systems Factorial Technology. These logical rule models ( Fific, Little, & Nosofsky, 2010 ) synthesize developments in decision-bound approaches to categorization with evidence accumulation and Mental Architecture approaches to response time. This synthesis allows for parametric predictions to be generated from a number of different model classes including serial, parallel, and coactive models. In categorization, these models have been applied to understanding how different dimensions are combined in making categorization decisions. The results from these studies converge to provide a novel theoretical account of separability and integrality.
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Response-Time Tests of Logical-Rule Models of Categorization
Journal of experimental psychology. Learning memory and cognition, 2011Co-Authors: Daniel R. Little, Robert M Nosofsky, Stephen E. DentonAbstract:A recent resurgence in logical-rule theories of categorization has motivated the development of a class of models that predict not only choice probabilities but also categorization response times (RTs; Fific´, Little, & Nosofsky, 2010). The new models combine Mental-Architecture and random-walk approaches within an integrated framework and predict detailed RT-distribution data at the level of individual participants and individual stimuli. To date, however, tests of the models have been limited to validation tests in which participants were provided with explicit instructions to adopt particular processing strategies for implementing the rules. In the present research, we test conditions in which categories are learned via induction over training exemplars and in which participants are free to adopt whatever classification strategy they choose. In addition, we explore how variations in stimulus formats, involving either spatially separated or overlapping dimensions, influence processing modes in rule-based classification tasks. In conditions involving spatially separated dimensions, strong evidence is obtained for application of logical-rule strategies operating in a serial-self-terminating processing mode. In conditions involving spatially overlapping dimensions, preliminary evidence is obtained that a mixture of serial and parallel processing underlies the application of rule-based classification strategies. The logical-rule models fare considerably better than major extant alternative models in accounting for the categorization RTs.
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logical rule models of classification response times a synthesis of Mental Architecture random walk and decision bound approaches
Psychological Review, 2010Co-Authors: Mario Fific, Daniel R. Little, Robert M NosofskyAbstract:We formalize and provide tests of a set of logical-rule models for predicting perceptual classification response times (RTs) and choice probabilities. The models are developed by synthesizing MentalArchitecture, random-walk, and decision-bound approaches. According to the models, people make independent decisions about the locations of stimuli along a set of component dimensions. Those independent decisions are then combined via logical rules to determine the overall categorization response. The time course of the independent decisions is modeled via random-walk processes operating along individual dimensions. Alternative Mental Architectures are used as mechanisms for combining the independent decisions to implement the logical rules. We derive fundaMental qualitative contrasts for distinguishing among the predictions of the rule models and major alternative models of classification RT. We also use the models to predict detailed RT-distribution data associated with individual stimuli in tasks of speeded perceptual classification.
James T. Townsend - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Survivor interaction contrasts for errored response times: Non-parametric contrasts for serial and parallel systems
2020Co-Authors: Haiyuan Yang, Daniel R. Little, Ami Eidels, James T. TownsendAbstract:Systems Factorial Technology (SFT) is a theoretically-derived methodology that allows for strong inferences to be made about the underlying processing Architecture (e.g., whether processing occurs in a pooled, coactive fashion or independently, in serial or in parallel). Measures of Mental Architecture using SFT have been restricted to the use of error-free response times. In this paper, through formal proofs and demonstrations, we extended the measure of Architecture, the survivor interaction contrast (SIC), to response times conditioned on whether they are correct or incorrect. We show that so long as an ordering relation (between stimulus conditions of different difficulty) is preserved, unique conditional SIC predictions are found for several classes of processing models. We further prove that this ordering relation holds for the popular Wiener diffusion model for both correct and error RTs but fails under some instantiations of a Poisson counter model.
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information processing alternatives to holistic perception identifying the mechanisms of secondary level holism within a categorization paradigm
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning Memory and Cognition, 2010Co-Authors: Mario Fific, James T. TownsendAbstract:Failure to selectively attend to a facial feature, in the part-to-whole paradigm, has been taken as evidence of holistic perception in a large body of face perception literature. In this article, we demonstrate that although failure of selective attention is a necessary property of holistic perception, its presence alone is not sufficient to conclude holistic processing has occurred. One must also consider the cognitive properties that are a natural part of information-processing systems, namely, Mental Architecture (serial, parallel), a stopping rule (self-terminating, exhaustive), and process dependency. We demonstrate that an analytic model (nonholistic) based on a parallel Mental Architecture and a self-terminating stopping rule can predict failure of selective attention. The new insights in our approach are based on the systems factorial technology, which provides a rigorous means of identifying the holistic–analytic distinction. Our main goal in the study was to compare potential changes in Architecture when 2 second-order relational facial features are manipulated across different face contexts. Supported by simulation data, we suggest that the critical concept for modeling holistic perception is the interactive dependency between features. We argue that without conducting tests for Architecture, stopping rule, and dependency, apparent holism could be confounded with analytic perception. This research adds to the list of converging operations for distinguishing between analytic forms and holistic forms of face perception.
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Information Processing Architectures: FundaMental Issues
2001Co-Authors: James T. TownsendAbstract:This article starts with a brief history of information-processing Architectures, emphasizing a traditional experiMental paradigm, the additive factors method, and the classic problem of model mimicry. Several solid approaches to identifying Mental Architecture are introduced with a discussion of the necessary assumptions for these tests. Other fundaMental issues attached to information-processing systems are also presented. A brief discussion with regard to challenges for the future concludes the article.
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Spatio-temporal properties of elementary perception: an investigation of parallel, serial, and coactive theories
Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1995Co-Authors: James T. Townsend, Georgie NozawaAbstract:Abstract A mathematical theory and related experiMental methodology are developed that permit strong, converging tests of parallel versus serial versus channel summation processing and of exhaustive versus self-terminating processing. An experiMental design is used for two studies, in which the presence or absence of a target in each of two positions, is factorially combined with two levels of brightness (a version of the double factorial paradigm). When both targets are present (redundant target condition) the two levels of brightness permit factorial technology to determine Mental Architecture and stopping rules. Comparison of the single versus double target conditions allows capacity analyses that strongly reinforce the double target factorial phase of the investigation. The results provide decisive support for parallel channels with either a self-terminating stopping rule or a coactive summation of information. General serial models and any variety of exhaustive processing were conclusively falsified.
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Stochastic dependencies in parallel and serial models: effects on systems factorial interactions
Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1994Co-Authors: James T. Townsend, Robin D. ThomasAbstract:Abstract This paper examines the behavior of stochastically dependent serial and parallel processing models in the setting of a 2 x 2 factorial experiment. Interactions found in factorial experiments can provide insight into the underlying Mental Architecture operating in a given psychological task. Recent theoretical results classify Mental networks according to the types of factorial interaction they predict when selectivity of the factors is assumed. When one allows this selectivity to break down through a stochastic dependence between processes, the characteristic patterns associated with distinct Architectures are disturbed. We investigate the relationships among: (a) parallel and serial Architectures, (b) positive, negative, and zero dependencies, and (c) types of mean reaction time factorial interaction. In particular, we show that in some cases, observable symptoms of a stochastic dependence arise. One of these, which we term a single factor reversal of mean processing times, arises as a result of a negative dependence under certain circumstances. Another characteristic of dependent systems that may contribute to their identifiability is that the interactions can be subadditive for some levels of the factors and superadditive at other levels. This change in contrast is not possible for independent serial and parallel models with selective influence.
Robert M Nosofsky - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Response-Time Tests of Logical-Rule Models of Categorization
Journal of experimental psychology. Learning memory and cognition, 2011Co-Authors: Daniel R. Little, Robert M Nosofsky, Stephen E. DentonAbstract:A recent resurgence in logical-rule theories of categorization has motivated the development of a class of models that predict not only choice probabilities but also categorization response times (RTs; Fific´, Little, & Nosofsky, 2010). The new models combine Mental-Architecture and random-walk approaches within an integrated framework and predict detailed RT-distribution data at the level of individual participants and individual stimuli. To date, however, tests of the models have been limited to validation tests in which participants were provided with explicit instructions to adopt particular processing strategies for implementing the rules. In the present research, we test conditions in which categories are learned via induction over training exemplars and in which participants are free to adopt whatever classification strategy they choose. In addition, we explore how variations in stimulus formats, involving either spatially separated or overlapping dimensions, influence processing modes in rule-based classification tasks. In conditions involving spatially separated dimensions, strong evidence is obtained for application of logical-rule strategies operating in a serial-self-terminating processing mode. In conditions involving spatially overlapping dimensions, preliminary evidence is obtained that a mixture of serial and parallel processing underlies the application of rule-based classification strategies. The logical-rule models fare considerably better than major extant alternative models in accounting for the categorization RTs.
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logical rule models of classification response times a synthesis of Mental Architecture random walk and decision bound approaches
Psychological Review, 2010Co-Authors: Mario Fific, Daniel R. Little, Robert M NosofskyAbstract:We formalize and provide tests of a set of logical-rule models for predicting perceptual classification response times (RTs) and choice probabilities. The models are developed by synthesizing MentalArchitecture, random-walk, and decision-bound approaches. According to the models, people make independent decisions about the locations of stimuli along a set of component dimensions. Those independent decisions are then combined via logical rules to determine the overall categorization response. The time course of the independent decisions is modeled via random-walk processes operating along individual dimensions. Alternative Mental Architectures are used as mechanisms for combining the independent decisions to implement the logical rules. We derive fundaMental qualitative contrasts for distinguishing among the predictions of the rule models and major alternative models of classification RT. We also use the models to predict detailed RT-distribution data associated with individual stimuli in tasks of speeded perceptual classification.
Philip J. Barnard - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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What Do We Mean by the Meanings of Music
Empirical Musicology Review, 2012Co-Authors: Philip J. BarnardAbstract:Drawing upon a recent review of the topic by Cross and Tolbert (2009), this paper briefly illustrates the diversity of theories concerning the nature of meanings in music and the challenges that need to be resolved to advance the field. A scheme for layered macro- and micro-theories for neural, Mental and behavioural systems is outlined to facilitate the development of a systematic and coherent body of theory. The core of the paper charts the evolutionary origins of a specific macro- theory of the organisation all the components of the human mind. This "Mental Architecture," known as Interacting Cognitive Subsystems (Barnard, 1985), incorporates not one, but two qualitatively distinct forms of meaning. Propositional meanings represent referentially specific ideas while implicational meanings encapsulate a yet more abstract and holistic form of meaning that blends conceptual material with the products of immediate distal and bodily sensations. While both forms of meaning interact in the interpretation and expression of musical meaning, such meanings are argued to be primarily implicational in nature. The paper concludes with a short discussion of how this approach might usefully be applied in the development of more precise specification of what music might mean in its various facets. Submitted 2012 January 6; accepted 2012 July 13.
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From Executive Mechanisms Underlying Perception and Action to the Parallel Processing of Meaning
Current Anthropology, 2010Co-Authors: Philip J. BarnardAbstract:The dominant conceptualization of working memory distinguishes mechanisms that handle auditory‐verbal and visuospatial representations from central executive resources that control and guide them. A straightforward case can be made that executive mechanisms evolved initially in the service of directing attention to salient environMental stimuli or events and selecting adaptive actions under the guidance of affective markers. In this paper, “working‐memory capacity” is viewed as an emergent property of interactions between specialist subsystems with no homunculus‐like executive. Mental capability could well have advanced via the differentiation of a single multimodal subsystem into additional new specialist subsystems that process not just verbal and spatial representations but also subsystems specialized to manipulate different kinds of meaning. The resulting overall Mental Architecture would devolve control of action and speech to peripheral mechanisms while allowing central subsystems to focus attention...
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Depression and attention to two kinds of meaning: A cognitive perspective.
Psychoanalytic psychotherapy, 2009Co-Authors: Philip J. BarnardAbstract:The complexity of a Mental disorder such as depression is such that a way of interlinking the neural, Mental and interpersonal levels is needed. This paper proposes that a theoretical framework which distinguishes, and relates, macro-theory and micro-theory at these levels can serve this purpose. The ‘Interacting Cognitive Subsystems’ approach to Mental Architecture is used to show how, via the detailed specification of Mental processes and representations, a macro-theory of Mental Architecture contributes to our understanding of depressed states. In the account advanced by Teasdale and Barnard depressed states are seen as being maintained by an abnormal version of a dynamic dialogue between two qualitatively distinct types of meaning: one is referentially specific, propositional meaning, the other consists of holistic schemata rich in latent content and is called implicational meaning. In depressed states with ruminative and avoidant thought patterns, the Mental function of attention is seen as being directed preferentially at propositional meanings. There is a corresponding neglect of attention to implicational meanings. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of how this approach can address transdiagnostic issues and how it may suggest new strategies for therapeutic interventions.
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Differentiation in cognitive and emotional meanings: An evolutionary analysis
Cognition & Emotion, 2007Co-Authors: Philip J. Barnard, David J. Duke, Richard W. Byrne, Iain DavidsonAbstract:It is often argued that human emotions, and the cognitions that accompany them, involve refinements of, and extensions to, more basic functionality shared with other species. Such refinements may rely on common or on distinct processes and representations. Multi-level theories of cognition and affect make distinctions between qualitatively different types of representations often dealing with bodily, affective and cognitive attributes of self-related meanings. This paper will adopt a particular multi-level perspective on Mental Architecture and show how a mechanism of subsystem differentiation could have allowed an evolutionarily “old” role for emotion in the control of action to have altered into one more closely coupled to meaning systems. We conclude by outlining some illustrative consequences of our analysis that might usefully be addressed in research in comparative psychology, cognitive archaeology, and in laboratory research on memory for emotional material.
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Reasoning with complementary pathways, not competing processes
2006Co-Authors: Jon May, Philip J. BarnardAbstract:The core of our argument is that the human Mental Architecture is composed of nine subsystems of equal status that interact as parts of a coherent overall system, and therefore one mind. Two of these subsystems represent qualitatively different types of meaning, one propositional in nature and the other a more abstract holistic representation, called implicational meaning (Barnard & Teasdale, 1991). Implicational meaning integrates over sensory, conceptual and bodily inputs and so captures affective states. Two aspects of this model relate to the claims of dual process theory. First, the two semantic subsystems stand in rather different relationships to the seven others. Implicational meanings receive direct and therefore fast inputs from visual, acoustic and body state subsystems while the construction and use of propositional meanings relies on inputs derived from longer, and therefore slower, processing routes. Interactions between these two meaning systems are argued to form the central engine of human ideation (Teasdale & Barnard, 1993). The second aspect of the model is that in these interactions processing activity can reflect properties of the two representations to differing degrees as a function of the mode in which meaning is processed. The mode of processing also directly relates to conscious experience. When implicational meanings dominate processing activity over time the same kinds of properties as are proposed for System 1 would be emphasised but when propositional meanings dominate the characteristic properties of System 2 would be more in evidence.
Ehtibar N. Dzhafarov - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Noncontextuality with marginal selectivity in reconstructing Mental Architectures.
Frontiers in psychology, 2015Co-Authors: Ru Zhang, Ehtibar N. DzhafarovAbstract:We present a general theory of series-parallel Mental Architectures with selectively influenced stochastically non-independent components. A Mental Architecture is a hypothetical network of processes aimed at performing a task, of which we only observe the overall time it takes under variable parameters of the task. It is usually assumed that the network contains several processes selectively influenced by different experiMental factors, and then the question is asked as to how these processes are arranged within the network, e.g., whether they are concurrent or sequential. One way of doing this is to consider the distribution functions for the overall processing time and compute certain linear combinations thereof (interaction contrasts). The theory of selective influences in psychology can be viewed as a special application of the interdisciplinary theory of (non)contextuality having its origins and main applications in quantum theory. In particular, lack of contextuality is equivalent to the existence of a “hidden” random entity of which all the random variables in play are functions. Consequently, for any given value of this common random entity, the processing times and their compositions (minima, maxima, or sums) become deterministic quantities. These quantities, in turn, can be treated as random variables with (shifted) Heaviside distribution functions, for which one can easily compute various linear combinations across different treatments, including interaction contrasts. This mathematical fact leads to a simple method, more general than the previously used ones, to investigate and characterize the interaction contrast for different types of series-parallel Architectures.
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Mental Architectures with selectively influenced but stochastically interdependent components
Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 2004Co-Authors: Ehtibar N. Dzhafarov, Richard Schweickert, Kyongje SungAbstract:Abstract The way external factors influence distribution functions for the overall time required to perform a Mental task (such as responding to a stimulus, or solving a problem) may be informative as to the underlying Mental Architecture, the hypothetical network of interconnected processes some of which are selectively influenced by some of the external factors. Under the assumption that all processes contributing to the overall performance time are stochastically independent, several basic results have been previously established. These results relate patterns of response time distribution functions produced by manipulating external factors to such questions as whether the hypothetical constituent processes in the Mental Architecture enter AND gates or OR gates, and whether pairs of processes are sequential or concurrent. The present study shows that all these results are also valid for stochastically interdependent component times, provided the selective dependence of these components upon external factors is understood within the framework of a recently proposed theory of selective influence. According to this theory each component is representable as a function of three arguments: the factor set selectively influencing it, a component-specific source of randomness, and a source of randomness shared by all the components.