RESISTANCE TO INTERFERENCE IN HUMAN ASSOCIATIVE LEARNING - EVIDENCE OF CONFIGURAL PROCESSING

In 4 experiments the authors used 2-stage designs to study susceptibil ity to interference in human discrimination learning. The experiments used a food allergy task. In Experiment 1, participants were presented with a discrimination in Stage 1 in which Food A predicted an allergy outcome (A --> O). In Stage 2, when combined with Food B, Food A pred icted the absence of the allergy (B --> O, AB --> no O). In the test p hase, Food A was found to have retained its Stage 1 association with t he allergy despite the potentially interfering Stage 2 trials. In Expe riment 2, a discrimination between 2 compounds (AB --,O, CD --> no O) remained intact despite subsequent complete revaluation of the element s, (A --> no O, B --> no O, C --> O, D --> O); in Experiments 3 and 4, a discrimination between 2 pairs of elements (A --> O, B --> O, D --> no O, D --> no O) remained intact despite subsequent complete revalua tion of the AB and CD compounds, (AB --> no O, CD --> O). These experi ments yielded evidence of remarkable resistance to interference in hum an discrimination learning. The results are at variance with the predi ctions of J. M. Pearce's (1987, 1994a) configural theory of associativ e learning.