Correlation of Selected Cognitive Abilities and Cognitive Processing Parameters: an Exploratory Study.

摘要

This pilot study investigated some relationships between tested ability variables and processing parameters obtained from memory search and visual search tasks. The 25 undergraduate students who participated in this study had participated in a previous investigation by Chiang and Atkinson. Slope and intercept parameters for the search tasks and digit span scores were available from that study on all subjects. A battery of traditional ability tests and several film tests were administered to all students. One of the film tests was designed to produce an 'erasure' or backward masking effect in short term visual memory. Factor scores were computed separately for ability tests and the short term visual memory test. These scores and other raw variables were then correlated with the parameters from the Chiang/Atkinson study. Multiple regression methods were used to regress ability variables on parameters and parameters on ability measures. In general, correlations between parameters and ability variables were low, and the regression of parameters on ability variables yielded larger R's than the regressions of abilities on the parameters. The short term visual memory film test did not correlate more substantially with processing parameters than it did with ability factors. The overall correlation pattern is interpreted in terms of an information processing model in which general ability is viewed as the executive function that selects, creates and implements programs that process and store information.