Implicit learning of unique and ambiguous serial transitions in the presence and absence of a distractor task.

Abstract

Three experiments investigated the effects of task load, time of secondary task onset, and response-stimulus time interval on direct and indirect measures of learning in the M. J. Nissen and P. Bullemer (1987) task. Experiment 1 demonstrated that both unique and ambiguous serial transitions can be learned in the absence and presence of an attentional distractor task. Experiment 2 showed that the time of secondary task onset affects the degree to which unique and ambiguous serial transitions are learned. Experiment 3 demonstrated that the learning of a sequential transition is affected by the length of the time interval between the response to a stimulus and the presentation of the next stimulus