Effects of 30 Years of Disuse on Exceptional Memory Performance.Jong-Sung Yoon,K. Anders Ericsson &Dario Donatelli -2018 -Cognitive Science 42 (S3):884-903.detailsIn the mid-1980s, Dario Donatelli participated in a laboratory study of the effects of around 800 h of practice on digit-span and increased his digit-span from 8 to 104 digits. This study assessed changes in the structure of his memory skill after around 30 years of essentially no practice on the digit-span task. On the first day of testing, his estimated span was only 10 digits, but over the following 3 days of testing it increased to 19 digits. Further analyses (...) of his recall performance and verbal reports identified which mechanisms of the original memory skill he could retrieve or reacquire over the 3 days of practice. We discuss theoretical implications for the retention of skilled memory performance, the effects of age-related changes in memory on it, and for the future study of the effects of disuse on exceptional performance and complex skill. (shrink)
Protocol Analysis.K. Anders Ericsson -1998 - In George Graham & William Bechtel,A Companion to Cognitive Science. Blackwell. pp. 425–432.detailsThe central problem which cognitive scientists face in studying thinking is that thinking cannot be observed directly by other people. The traditional solution has been to rely on introspective methods, where individuals observe their own thinking and reflect on its characteristics. In everyday life, the most common technique involves asking people questions about their thinking, knowledge, and strategies. Psychologists have refined the methods for questioning individuals by designing questionnaires and structured interviews. However, these two ways of obtaining information about thinking (...) share two fundamental methodological problems. First, the accuracy of the reports cannot be assessed, because in naturally occurring situations in everyday life the investigator doesn't have any other empirical evidence against which to evaluate the validity of the subjects' reported information. Hence, psychologists are forced to trust the subjects to provide valid information. The second issue concerns whether even those individuals who strive to give accurate reports are able to access and supply valid information on the cognitive processes that mediate their behavior. (shrink)
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Basic capacities can be modified or circumvented by deliberate practice: A rejection of talent accounts of expert performance.K. Anders Ericsson -1998 -Behavioral and Brain Sciences 21 (3):413-414.detailsTo make genuine progress toward explicating the relation between innate talent and high levels of ability, we need to consider the differences in structure between most everyday abilities and expert performance. Only in expert performance is it possible to show consistently that individuals can acquire skills to circumvent and modify basic characteristics (talent).
The search for fixed generalizable limits of “pure STM” capacity: Problems with theoretical proposals based on independent chunks.K. Anders Ericsson &Elizabeth P. Kirk -2001 -Behavioral and Brain Sciences 24 (1):120-121.detailsCowan's experimental techniques cannot constrain subject's recall of presented information to distinct independent chunks in short-term memory (STM). The encoding of associations in long-term memory contaminates recall of pure STM capacity. Even in task environments where the functional independence of chunks is convincingly demonstrated, individuals can increase the storage of independent chunks with deliberate practice – well above the magical number four.
Can the parieto-frontal integration theory be extended to account for individual differences in skilled and expert performance in everyday life?Roy W. Roring,Kiruthiga Nandagopal &K. Anders Ericsson -2007 -Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30 (2):168-169.detailsPerformance on abstract unfamiliar tasks used to measure intelligence has not been found to correlate with individual differences in highly skilled and expert performance. Given that cognitive and neural structures and regions mediating performance change as skill increases, the structures highlighted by parieto-frontal integration theory are unlikely to account for individual differences in skilled cognitive achievement in everyday life.