抄録
Two experiments were run to investigate the relative effects of signal rate, stimulus rate and signal probability on visual vigilance performance. In both experiments the task was to detect unusually large deflections of a voltmeter needle which were intermingled with normal deflections during a period of 40min. The results suggested that stimulus rate was the more potent determiner of detection performance than signal rate or signal probability. However, when the signal probability was extremely high (0.45), the signal probability was a major determiner of detection performance. The results were discussed with reference to expectancy theory, arousal theory and the elicited observing rate hypothesis.
