Numbers

?
What is relative numerosity discrimination?
Ability to discriminate between sets of items on the basis of the relative number of items that they contain
1 of 48
Emmerton, Lohmann and Neimann, 1997
Trained pigeons to discriminate between few (1/2 items) and many '6-7 items)
2 of 48
However?
The birds could ignore the number and instead be using some other feature of the display
3 of 48
What did they do ?
Invery colours, the birds still responded correctly
4 of 48
How else did they change their experiment?
They added new numbers such as 3.5.6 and 7. 3 was treated more like 1 and 2 and 4 and 5 was treated more like 6/7
5 of 48
Matsuzawa?
chimp called Abi had to select one of six response keys (labelled 1-6) when shown arrays of red pencils with 1-6 pencils per array. Achieved > 90% accuracy
6 of 48
But this is not necessarily what?
The same as counting, animals could be learning about specific perceptual pattern - perceptual matching
7 of 48
What did Matsuzawa argue?
Abi could transfer her ability to arrays of different types of items change the arrays of pencils she could still do it
8 of 48
However, what is a problem with this experiment?
Other number is confounding with other factors such as time and space, for example: smaller number of items also takes up less space is it the size of the display controls the response not the number?
9 of 48
What is a sample trial?
- 1 orange chalk, 2 orange wood, 4 purple wood, 5 purple chalk. How many Purple wood? (4)
10 of 48
What is an alternative explanation?
Are animals substitsing? The perception at a glance of the number of items present without counting them successively the maximum number of items that can be counted in this way is 5
11 of 48
If you are counting then what?
The RT should increase with every item
12 of 48
Meck and Church
Serially presented items
13 of 48
What were rats trained with?
Two signals: 2 or 8 pulses of white noise
14 of 48
After 2 pulses what did the rats have to do?
Press the left lever
15 of 48
After 8 pulses what did the rats have to do?
Press the right lever
16 of 48
However, what could animals be doing?
Responding on the basis of the total time rather than number of pulses?
17 of 48
How did researchers investigate this
They devised a test in which both stimuli lasted 4 seconds
18 of 48
What was found?
They continued to respond correctly
19 of 48
The rats were also tested with what?
Pulses of light and continued to respond appropriately
20 of 48
Davis and Bradford?
Rats had access to a plant with food pellets on it
21 of 48
What did each rat have to do?
Eat a designated number of pellets to eat if he ate more the experimenter shouted No! or clapped loudly
22 of 48
What happened when they ate the right number or fewer than the target?
They were rewarded by praise and petting, got it right even when no longer rewarded for correct responses, transferred to sunflower seeds
23 of 48
Capaldi and Miller 1998
- Rats trained in a runway, sometimes with food at the end. If the rats expect food they run fast!
24 of 48
What were they trained with?
with following sequences of reinforced trials and nonreinforced trials – RRRN and NRRRN - Learn to anticipate final N trial and run slow
25 of 48
What else were they trained with?
- And were trained with rat pellets; but if one or more of the rewards in the sequence changed to, for example, cocoa pops they still did well
26 of 48
What is numerosity?
The property of the display e.g. two items onto a label that represents that numerosity
27 of 48
What is a numeron?
Number words or symbols as labels but presumably animals use non verbal labels
28 of 48
What is the one to one principle?
Each item is assigned only one numeron
29 of 48
What is a stable order principle?
Numeron must always be assigned in the same order
30 of 48
What is the cardinal principle?
The final numeron assigned applies to the whole display
31 of 48
What is ordinal scale?
4>3>2>1 how these laels are ordered in relation to quantity
32 of 48
What is interval scale?
The size of the difference between each item is the same
33 of 48
Biron and Matsuzawa (2000)
- Ai trained to touch arabic numerals in ascending order - But some argued that it was just rote learning of a particular stimulus-response sequence... - no requirement to know anything about the quantitative relation between numbers
34 of 48
What were chimps trained to order?
arrays of 1-4 items in ascending, descending, or random order
35 of 48
What could they learn?
Ascending and descending orders but not the arbitary order 1-3-2-4
36 of 48
What were they tested with
Novel displays 5-9 items
37 of 48
What did they teach the chimp?
taught an ascending order could generalize immediately to the higher numbers - But that taught a descending order could only generalise after further training
38 of 48
Pepperberg?
What number green, this means he knew about naming quantities and identifying numbers but not about applying numbers to quantities
39 of 48
What is the ability to do arithmetic?
- To perform the operations of addition, subtraction etc. To some extent this can be done by rote learning (e.g. times tables); but true mathematical competence would allow these operations to be generalised to new situations in a way
40 of 48
Sheba
Trained to label arrays with counter, and then with arabic numerals
41 of 48
What was she given?
Extensive training with numbers 0-4
42 of 48
What is the method?
- In the final test a number of oranges were hidden in the lab, in any of three hiding places. Sheba had to find all the oranges, and then pick the arabic numeral that represented the sum of all the oranges that were hidden
43 of 48
What happened after 12 training sessions?
She performed about 85% correct
44 of 48
What is a potential problem?
could argue she memorized all the ways of adding 0,1,2,3,4 - to a total of 4... 0+0 0+1 0+2 0+3 0+4 1+1 1+2 1+3 2+2
45 of 48
She could also perform accurately when the experimenter hid cards with numbers written on them, rather than what?
than oranges and she performed above chance right away implies understanding of the interval scale – if she understood only bigger than she would have chosen 4 as often as 3
46 of 48
What was Chimp A given?
- Chimp A was given a choice between two amounts of candy
47 of 48
Whichever chimp A chose was given to Chimp B and chimp A got to eat the unchosen one, therefore?
- In chimp A’s interest to choose the smaller quantity, so it could eat the larger quantity. Completely unable to solve this task - Unless the candy was substituted by numerals
48 of 48

Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

Emmerton, Lohmann and Neimann, 1997

Back

Trained pigeons to discriminate between few (1/2 items) and many '6-7 items)

Card 3

Front

However?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

What did they do ?

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

How else did they change their experiment?

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
View more cards

Comments

No comments have yet been made

Similar Psychology resources:

See all Psychology resources »See all Numbers resources »