Perceptual learning through optimization of attentional weighting: Human versus optimal Bayesian learner

BackgroundHumans and other animals change the way they perceive the world due to experience. This process has been labeled as perceptual learning, and implies that adult nervous systems can adaptively modify the way in which they process sensory stimulation. However, the mechanisms by which the brain modifies this capacity have not been sufficiently analyzed.Methodology/Principal FindingsWe studied the neural mechanisms of human perceptual learning by combining electroencephalographic (EEG) recordings of brain activity and the assessment of psychophysical performance during training in a visual search task. All participants improved their perceptual performance as reflected by an increase in sensitivity (d') and a decrease in reaction time. The EEG signal was acquired throughout the entire experiment revealing amplitude increments, specific and unspecific to the trained stimulus, in event-related potential (ERP) components N2pc and P3 respectively. P3 unspecific modification can be related to context or task-based learning, while N2pc may be reflecting a more specific attentional-related boosting of target detection. Moreover, bell and U-shaped profiles of oscillatory brain activity in gamma (30–60 Hz) and alpha (8–14 Hz) frequency bands may suggest the existence of two phases for learning acquisition, which can be understood as distinctive optimization mechanisms in stimulus processing.Conclusions/SignificanceWe conclude that there are reorganizations in several neural processes that contribute differently to perceptual learning in a visual search task. We propose an integrative model of neural activity reorganization, whereby perceptual learning takes place as a two-stage phenomenon including perceptual, attentional and contextual processes.

This article presents the results of a collective case study exploring how K12 practitioners perceive the interaction of systems thinking, creativity, and learning from failure within their professional practice. In order to identify K12 practitioners who were well-versed in systems thinking, we targeted students within an instructional design and technology graduate program that included a course on human performance improvement (HPI). At the conclusion of the semester, all students in the course were invited to participate in an individual, semi-structured interview where they discussed the relationship among these three concepts within their professional practice. Participants described how learning from failure and creativity manifest within their practice and through systems thinking. Additionally, they identified that learning from failure and creativity are crucial components of problem solving. Further insights for how these three concepts can impact professional practice are addressed.

In human–computer interaction interfaces, icons serve as highly symbolic elements that convey information and significantly influence the performance of visual search and other tasks. Thus, the selection of appropriate colors plays a crucial role in the design of human–computer interfaces. This study aimed to investigate the effects of icon color combinations on human visual search task performance across various cognitive load conditions. The experiment was divided into two parts, involving a cognitive load test experiment and an icon search task, wherein the former required participants to select the target icon from 16 de-colored icons, and the latter involved selecting the target icon from 16 color combinations of 8 colors (background colors: black, red, blue, and purple; foreground colors: white, yellow, green, and turquoise). A total of 20 participants (11 females and 9 males, all aged between 18 and 24 years) were recruited for this experiment to perform both tasks sequentially. Through a comprehensive consideration of factors such as the NASA-TLX scale, retrieval time, etc., the experimental results revealed that cognitive load increased with time pressure, resulting in varying optimal color combinations for different cognitive load levels. Additionally, background colors did not affect task response time under different cognitive loads, whereas white foreground color was superior to turquoise foreground color in a medium cognitive load environment. Meanwhile, our results recommend prioritizing white-on-black as the preferred color combination, given that it demonstrated excellent cognitive performance in all three cognitive load environments. Conversely, white-on-blue is not recommended as a color combination for the design of high cognitive load environments. Concerning medium cognitive load environments, yellow-on-red or white-on-purple color combinations were preferred. Finally, in low cognitive load environments, white-on-purple is recommended as the primary color combination. Overall, this study provides a theoretical reference for the future design of interactive interface icons across various contexts.

1. Human perceptual learning in discrimination of the oblique orientation was studied using psychophysical methods. Subjects were trained daily to improve their ability to identify the orientation of a circular 2.5 deg diameter unidimensional noise field. Dramatic improvements in sensitivity to contour orientation occurred over a period of 15-20 days. The improved performance persisted for several months. Improvement was more evident between daily sessions than within sessions. This was partly due to fatigue interfering with the learning effect. Moreover, a consolidation period seemed to be required. 2. Improvement was restricted to the position of the stimulus being trained. This position dependency of the learning effect proved very precise. After training at a specific stimulus position, merely displacing the stimulus to an adjacent position caused a marked increase in thresholds. 3. No transfer of the training effect was observed between orientations. Following a shift of 90 deg away from the trained orientation, performance fell, even below the initial level. 4. We observed complete to almost complete transfer between the two eyes. 5. Our results suggest plastic changes at a level of the visual processing stream where input from both eyes has come together, but where generalization for spatial localization and orientation has not yet occurred.

- The goal of this research is to get data about the effect of motivation and perception to learning style in together to achievement of learning at Junior High School in Pamulang Tangerang Selatan. This research uses research method with correlation and regration analysis. It is mean, making connection between data that tells about motivation and preception to learning style in together to learning achievment. The data about motivation and perception to learning style in together to learning achievment could be got over questioner by resercher with measuring something that has connection to: (1) there are effects of learning motivation signficantly and perception to learning style of studetns in together to achievment of learning. It can be known from the getting score of Fo=9,109 and Sig.0,000 < 0,05. In together, the variable of learning motivation and perception to learning style of students gave contribution 24,2% to the variable of learning achievment in english. (2) There are effects of learning motivation significantly to English learning achievment. It can be known from the getting score of t hitung =2,214 and Sig. 0,031 < 0,05. The variable of learning motivation contrbuted 12,67% in increasing English learning achievment. (3) There are effects of perception to studetns learning style to students learning achievment significantly. It can be known by the getting score of t hitung = 2,061 and Sig. 0,044 < 0,05. The variable of perception to studetns learning style contributed 11,53% in increasing English Learning achievment. It tells us that there are possitive effects and significant to learning motivation and perception in learning style to student learning achievment.

Todd and Mackintosh (1990) found that recognition memory of pigeons for pictures was better when the same pictures were used each session (a recency task) than when different slides were used (a novelty task); they attributed the superior performance on the recency task to perceptual learning. Three experiments explored two alternative accounts. One was that their use of a within-subject design could have allowed the strategy adopted in the recency task to influence adversely the strategy used in the novelty task. This possibility was ruled out by Experiment 1, which showed superior performance in the recency task when a between-subject design was used. A second account proposes that slide-reward associations formed (in both tasks) during first presentations of slides interfere with appropriate performance during second presentations (associative interference); in the recency task, however, the high long-term associative strength of the slides restricts the consequence of a single slide-reward pairing to a short-term effect, and associative interference occurs at short retention intervals only. This account was explored in Experiment 2, which found no evidence that increases in retention interval resulted in reduction of associative interference in the recency task, and in Experiment 3, where associative interference was shown to occur but was of comparable magnitude in the recency and novelty tasks. By elimination, the results support a perceptual learning interpretation.

Previous research by Kaniel & Lubow in 1986 found that young children (aged 4-5 years) exhibited poorer learning (latent inhibition) to preexposed stimuli than older children (aged 7-10 years). The aim of our research was to develop a computer-based, child-friendly study that would replicate and extend the work of Kaniel & Lubow in a way that ruled out other, attention-based explanations of their effect. One hundred and four children and 32 undergraduate students took part in our experiment. This consisted of a preexposure/study phase in which participants were asked to press computer keys in response to clipart pictures of animals and dinosaurs. Each animal or dinosaur picture was preceded by one of 2 "warning signals" that acted as the preexposed stimuli (to which no response was required). In the test phase that followed, the participants had to either press the spacebar or withhold their response to each preexposed stimulus and two novel stimuli. They learned which response was correct by trial and error using the feedback provided. The accuracy and reaction time (RT) of the responses during the test phase were analyzed and indicated that the youngest children showed significantly lower mean accuracy and longer mean response times to the preexposed stimuli than to stimuli they had not been preexposed to. In contrast, the older children showed no significant differences in their responses to preexposed and novel stimuli. These results are consistent with those found by Kaniel & Lubow and as such provide additional evidence for latent inhibition in young children. We discuss the implications for theories of perceptual learning in humans. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Research on sequence effects on learning visual categories has shown that interleaving (i.e., studying the categories in a mixed manner) facilitates category induction as compared to blocking (i.e., studying the categories one by one), but learners are unaware of the interleaving effect and prefer blocking. However, little attention has been paid to sequence effects in perceptual learning across further sensory modalities. The present (preregistered) research addresses this shortcoming by using auditory (birdcalls), olfactory (tealeaves), gustatory (ingredient mixtures), and tactile (stones) stimuli across four analog experiments. The number of participants per experiment was determined based on a medium effect size of interleaving. Participants studied six categories (with six exemplars, respectively) either interleaved or blocked. No single experiment showed a significant effect of interleaving. We ran a comprehensive meta-analysis based on the data from all experiments, which revealed a significant small effect of interleaving, demonstrating its applicability to perceptual learning across all sensory modalities. Learners in the interleaved condition underestimated their classification performance. Overall, learners did not rate interleaving as less effective than blocking, which is at odds with previous studies that consistently demonstrated a metacognitive preference of blocking. Our findings suggest that learners rely less on conventional beliefs about the effectivity of study sequence when dealing with unfamiliar (blindfolded) perceptual learning tasks.

Nuclear power plant safety is dependent upon human performance related to plant operations. To provide improvements in human performance, data collection and assessment play key roles. To address these concerns, the Human Factors Information System (HFIS) is designed to meet the needs of the human factors specialists of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). These specialists identify personnel errors and provide guidance designed to prevent such errors. HFIS is a simple and modular system designed for use on a personal computer. It is designed to contain four separate modules that provide information indicative of program or function effectiveness as well as safety-related human performance based on programmatic and performance data. These modules include the Human Factors Status module; the Regulatory Programs module; the Licensee Event Report (LER) module; and the Operator Requalification Performance module. Information from these modules can either be used separately or can be combined due to the integrated nature of the system. HFIS has the capability, therefore, to provide insights into those areas of human factors that can reduce the probability of events caused by personnel error at nuclear power plants and promote the health and safety of the public. This information system concept can be applied to other industries as well as the nuclear industry.

Perceptual learning (PL) can significantly improve human performance in perceptual tasks primarily through template reweighting. Previous studies have documented how PL changes perceptual template in stimulus feature space. We investigated how PL reweights visual information in time. With a dynamic external noise paradigm and the elaborated perceptual template model (ePTM) analysis, we found that training with an orientation identification task in the zero external noise condition reduced contrast thresholds in both zero and high external noise conditions, whereas training in the high external noise condition only reduced contrast thresholds in high external noise conditions. The ePTM analysis showed that training in both zero and high external noise changed the overall amplitude, but not the shape of the temporal window of the perceptual template to exclude external noise across time, and training in zero external noise additionally reduced additive internal noise. Our results provided additional constraints for models of PL. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Action video games playing improves learning to learn in perceptual learning

In their 1994 publication, Starkes and Lindley considered whether perceptual skill could be trained through the observation of video simulations of sport situations. We return to this topic 20 years later and provide a critical review of the subsequent research on perceptual learning in sport. We reflect on the implications from recent empirical evidence, which indicates that perceptual expertise in sport is best captured using experimental methods that allow participants to perceive and act (i.e., produce an interceptive action) against an opponent in real-time. Despite the pertinent implications that these findings have for the training of perceptual skill, until now, a review has not been forthcoming. Specifically, we consider the implications of an ecological approach to perceptual learning for training interventions in sport. We provide a critical review of current literature, before focussing on an ecological theory of learning as a framework for our perspective. We then overview two contemporary topics in ecological psychology - continuum of contact and between-participant variability in perception-action - before considering the implications of our perspective for future research.

In this review, we explore how reward signals shape perceptual learning in animals and humans. Perceptual learning is the well-established phenomenon by which extensive practice elicits selective improvement in one's perceptual discrimination of basic visual features, such as oriented lines or moving stimuli. While perceptual learning has long been thought to rely on 'top-down' processes, such as attention and decision-making, a wave of recent findings suggests that these higher-level processes are, in fact, not necessary. Rather, these recent findings indicate that reward signals alone, in the absence of the contribution of higher-level cognitive processes, are sufficient to drive the benefits of perceptual learning. Here, we will review the literature tying reward signals to perceptual learning. Based on these findings, we propose dual underlying mechanisms that give rise to perceptual learning: onemechanism that operates 'automatically' and is tied directly to reward signals, and another mechanism that involves more'top-down', goal-directedcomputations.

This research investigates how organisations where e-learning is already firmly established experience the adoption of mobile learning. Drawing on responses from training managers and sales and service staff, it investigates key aspects of mobile learning, as understood in organisations; how they perceive the relationship between mobile learning and e-learning provision; their key objectives for deploying mobile learning; and the dynamics of mobile learning practice as it is emerging. The project uses a multi-case study methodology with data collected from three corporate organisations in different sectors (healthcare, computing, and financial services). In each case, data is drawn from interviews with training managers and questionnaire responses from sales and service staff. Sharples’ framework for mobile learning, which focuses on the mobility of learners and learning as ‘conversations’, forms the analytical basis for the study. Three case reports are first presented, and then a cross-case analysis is conducted to draw out points of commonality and difference between the cases. My findings show that mobile learning is understood in the organisations through the lens of e-learning: while the two are not perceived as the same thing, the relationship is perceived to be close. While some barriers to adoption are technological, most concern social factors (stakeholder resistance and lack of leadership support). There is also a lack of use of collaborative aspects of mobile learning in emerging practices, even though respondents were aware that such possibilities existed. Most importantly, actual practices of mobile learning are driven more by the organisations’ business needs and how they have previously used e-learning, rather than their specific perceptions of mobile learning. The work contributes to existing research on mobile learning in the corporate sector (especially the perceived advantages and effectiveness of mobile learning, and challenges in adopting it), and in particular, the influence of context (social factors) on integrating mobile learning in organisations.

Sensory Plasticity in Human Motor Learning