Direct Learning in Auditory Perception: An Information-Space Analysis of Auditory Perceptual Learning of Object Length

Abstract

The theory of direct learning characterizes perception of a given property as occupying a locus in an information space and characterizes perceptual learning as continuous movement in that information space toward a more optimal locus. Three experiments investigated whether such an information-based account of learning could be applied to perceptual learning in audition. The results of Experiment 1 showed that perception of length by audition could be characterized as occupying a locus in an information space consisting of inertial variables that constrain perception of length by dynamic or effortful touch. Experiments 2 and 3 showed that feedback about length led to predictable movements across the information space from less optimal to more optimal loci. Such results provide additional support for the theory of direct learning and suggest that convergence information may be modality independent.

Acknowledgments

Portions of the data were presented at the North American Meeting of the International Society for Ecological Psychology, June 2014, Oxford, OH, and the 54th Meeting of the Psychonomic Society, November 2014, Long Beach, CA. We thank Claire Michaels for helpful discussion and David Jacobs for comments on a previous draft of this article.

Notes

¹ Given that E_α is calculated using ln(I₁) and ln(I₃), rod length values were ln transformed before the squared correlation at each locus was calculated. This is the case for the usefulness curves depicted in Figures 1, 4, and 7.

² Step 1: r = .67, p <  001; Step 2: r = .65, p <  001.