Asymmetric categorization in the sequential auditory domain

Authors

Delbé, C., French, R. M., Bigand, E.

Year

2008

Title

Asymmetric categorization in the sequential auditory domain

Journal / book / conference

L'Année Psychologique

Abstract

An unusual visual category learning asymmetry in infants was observed by Quinn, Eimas, and Rosenkrantz (1993). A series of experiments and simulations seemed to show that this asymmetry was due the perceptual inclusion of the cat category within the dog category because of the greater perceptual variability of the distributions of the visual features of dogs compared to cats (Mareschal & French, 1997; Mareschal, French, & Quinn, 2000; French, Mermillod, Quinn, & Mareschal, 2001; French, Mareschal, Mermillod, & Quinn, 2004). In the present paper, we explore whether this asymmetric categorization phenomenon generalizes to the auditory domain. We developed a series of sequential auditory stimuli analogous to the visual stimuli in Quinn et A Two experiments on adult listeners using these stimuli seem to demonstrate the presence of an identical asymmetric categorization effect in the sequential auditory domain. Furthermore, connectionist simulations confirmed that purely bottom-up processes were largely responsible for our behavioural results.

Issue

Volume

108

Pages

589-615

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