The effect of practice upon the perception of simple designs masked by more complex designs.

Abstract

Experiments are described in which subjects were required to search for simple designs concealed in more complex ones. 8 different simple designs were employed. The time taken to detect the designs and the errors committed were determined. When the results indicated improvement as a function of practice, further trails were undertaken in which the time between trials was varied. However, the amount of time elapsing between trials was found to be unimportant. The number of designs that stood out immediately (within 2 secs.) increased as a function of time in spite of variation of time-interval between trials. Methods by which subjects gained facility in detecting the designs are described. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)