Social Facilitation

Choice of Motor or Memory Task

• Motor task: In our discussion of subordinate and dominant responses to a situation, it was suggested that the distinction between the two could be viewed as the difference between acquisition and proficiency. This task will permit us to assess the influence of independent variables on performance in terms of the level of learning on the "rotary pursuit". On the table before the subject is a 12" turntable and a stylus (a pencil like pointer). The turntable spins at 30rpm and has a dime-sized metal disc imbedded near its outer edge. The subject's task is to make contact between the disc and the end of the stylus. The subject may initiate a "trial" any time he wishes, and the number of revolutions that the contact is maintained is automatically recorded. When on target, a light behind the subject goes on. It goes off when contact is broken. During the first ten trials the subject's performance is poor, but improving. That is, time on the disc is increasing over trials. At about the fifteenth trial and beyond, performance usually levels off.

• Memory task: Another expression of the relationship between dominant and subordinate responses is that the former can be termed high in habit strength and the latter low in habit strength. Habit strength here refers to nothing more complicated than the number of times a particular response has been elicited by or is given to a particular stimulus or situation. Habit strength of a response in a verbal (not necessarily spoken) task is relatively easy to define and establish. The subject is seated before a TV monitor. A nonsense word, IKTITAF, appears briefly on the screen. The subject is required to write the word, or its approximation, on a card. This sequence is repeated some 15 times. Randomly interspersed among the presentations of IKTITAF are 5 presentations of the word AFWORBU. (The possible specific effects of such words are controlled for by using different random combinations of words for different subjects. We have a large stock of such words including COVADRA, SARICIK, LOKANTA, RAJECKI, NANSOMA, etc.)

  When finished with presentations we might say that the habit strength of IKTITAF to AFWORBU in this situation was about 3 to 1. To test this notion we can place the subject in an ambiguous situations, demand a response, and observe what response the subject gives. One such ambiguous situation is known as the "pseudo-recognition task".

  We now tell the subject that we will again flash some words on the TV screen, but for a shorter time. We will flash a word and the subject is to identify it and write it down. If he's not sure of the word he is to guess. When the words a re flashed on the screen they are, in fact, unintelligible, because the are not words but blurs. We flash 20 blurs and insist that the subject make a response even if he cannot read them. The only thing he can use as a basis for his response are the habits or habit strengths built in during the original presentations. If the strengths differ, we should see differences in the proportion of responses that are chosen from one or the other of the words the subject saw earlier.