Journal article
Detecting variety: what's so special about uniformity?
Journal of experimental psychology. General, Vol.131(1), pp.131-143
03/2002
DOI: 10.1037/0096-3445.131.1.131
PMID: 11900100
Abstract
People and pigeons were taught to make 1 of 2 responses to 16-icon arrays that differed in their visual variability. In 2 experiments, participants had to (a) discriminate a collection of identical items from a collection in which 2 or more items were different or (b) discriminate a collection of different items from a collection in which 2 or more items were identical. In Experiment 1, humans found it much easier to discriminate uniformity from all levels of diversity. In Experiment 2, pigeons also found it easier to discriminate uniformity from all levels of diversity, but the size of this effect was smaller than that observed in people. These and other results suggest that both species are predisposed to notice differences rather than similarities.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Detecting variety: what's so special about uniformity?
- Creators
- Michael E Young - Department of Psychology, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, 62901-6502, USA. meyoung@siu.eduEdward A Wasserman
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Journal of experimental psychology. General, Vol.131(1), pp.131-143
- Publisher
- United States
- DOI
- 10.1037/0096-3445.131.1.131
- PMID
- 11900100
- ISSN
- 0096-3445
- eISSN
- 1939-2222
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 03/2002
- Academic Unit
- Psychological and Brain Sciences; Iowa Neuroscience Institute
- Record Identifier
- 9984070646702771
Metrics
17 Record Views