SPATIAL ATTENTION AND IMPLICIT SEQUENCE LEARNING - EVIDENCE FOR INDEPENDENT LEARNING OF SPATIAL AND NONSPATIAL SEQUENCES

This research investigated whether regular spatial orienting sequences can be learned implicitly and independently of response requirements. In a new version of a serial response task introduced by M. J. Nissen and P. Bullemer (1987) participants had to discriminate between objec ts that could occur at different locations. Independent sequences dete rmined the succession of locations and objects. Even participants who were not aware of any regularities exhibited evidence for learning of both sequences (Experiment 1). Experiment 2 showed that the joint lear ning of spatial and object sequences was as efficient as learning of s ingle sequences and that it even occurred when learning required memor y for past sequence elements and attention was blocked through a secon dary tone-counting task. Results are consistent with the idea that ind ependent systems may exist for the implicit acquisition of spatial and nonspatial regularities.