Effects of temporal stimuli in the acquisition of a serial tracking task

This study investigated the effects of temporal stimuli on qualitative responses during the acquisition of a serial tracking task. One hundred and twenty young adult men performed 100 trials of a tracking task that consisted of touching six response keys in a given sequence in response to flashing light-emitting diodes in order to identify and learn the serial pattern. Six experimental groups were created with diverse inter stimuli intervals (ISI): G1: ISI = 300 ms; G2: ISI = 400 ms; G3: ISI = 500 ms; G4: ISI = 600 ms; G5: ISI = 700 ms; and G6: ISI = 800 ms. Performance was assessed by means of four types of responses: omission, error, correct, and anticipatory responses. The results showed differential effects of temporal stimulus uncertainty in the hierarchy of responses as the learning course progressed.