The purpose of this experiment was to study the effects of experimentally induced muscular tension (IMT), original spontaneous muscular tension (MT) which each subject had usually in laboratory, upon verbal learning. The main problem points were as follows.
(1) Does IMT affect learning or recall?
(2) Does High-MT facilitate recall more than Low-MT?
(3) Is there an interaction between the effects of IMT and MT?
(4) Does IMT-during-learning (T-T, T-N groups) affect recall even on the following trials?
Experiment I: Subjects (
Ss) were 48 undergraduate students. A Hull-type memory drum, presenting each word for a 3 sec. duration, was used. A list consisted of 12 nonsense syllables. A weight hand dynamometer, evoking IMT, was used.
Ss pulled the dynamometer at a value of 1/5 maximum tension determined for each
S. The
Ss' task was to learn 12 nonsense syllables. Time intervals between list presentation and recall were 0, 100, 200 and 360 sec.
Ss were required to recall words freely as many as possible. Group T-T learned and recalled under IMT. Group T-N learned under IMT and recalled under no IMT. Group N-T learned under no IMT and recalled under IMT. Group N-N learned and recalled under no IMT. As a measure of MT, eye blink rates were measured during 5 learning trials. With this measure, each of four IMT group was further divided into two subgroups: high muscular tension group (H-MT) and low muscular tension group (L-MT). After 4 free recall trials,
Ss were required to relearn to a learning criterion.
Experiment II:
Ss were 40 undergraduate students and were divided into four IMT groups (T-T, T-N, N-T, N-N).
Ss were shown only once a list consisting of 7 paired Japanese verbs. The temporal intervals between stimuli presentation and recall were 0, 60, 120 and 180sec. Eyeblink rates were not measured. Otherwise the procedure was nearly equal to that of Exp. I.
The main results were as follows.
(1) In both Exp. I and Exp. II, recall was facilitated in the groups under IMT (T-T, N-T), as compared with the results of the groups under no IMT (T-N, N-N) (Figs. 2 & 6). Thus IMT failed to have an effect upon habit formation.
(2) Recall in group H-MT was better than that of group L-MT (Fig. 3). Thus recall was facilitated by originally higher muscular tension.
(3) The after-effect of IMT on the following trials was studied with the performance of group T-N. In Exp. I, the after-effect of IMT was not found but in Exp. II it was shown up to 120 sec. after acquisition (Fig. 6).
(4) The interaction between the effects of IMT and MT was not found (Fig. 1). However further studies are necessary to investigate into individual innate muscular tension and muscular tension generalized from IMT and other muscular movement.
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