Perceptual learning by preschool children using stimuli with varying proportions of common elements

The effect of preexposure to visual stimuli on subsequent discrimination was studied in 17 girls and 23 boys, ages 53 to 61 mo., using a test in which a sample stimulus had to be identified from a set of comparison stimuli. Preexposure significantly facilitated discrimination. This facilitation was more noticeable between stimuli which shared a large proportion of common elements. The results were consistent with an associative theory of the representation of stimuli suggested by McLaren, Kaye, and Mackintosh in 1989, and implications are considered for teaching.