Thirty female undergraduates were given a central and incidental learning task with twelve pairs of word. In the task, the subjects studied one of each pair with focused attention (central learning) and the other with divided attention (incidental learning). Half of the pairs were presented under spaced condition and another half under massed condition. Each pair repeated three times. The spaced pairs were presented with four to seven pairs intervening between occurrences and the massed pairs with no pairs. Immediately after the presentation, the subjects were given a free recall test. To examine selective attention in the presentation period, the numbers and the durations of eye fixation were recorded. Main findings were as follows; (1) spacing effects were observed in central learning condition but not in incidental learning condition, and (2) the records of eye fixation showed that the subjects focused their attention to central learning stimuli and there were no differences between spaced and massed conditions. Authors discussed the findings largely in terms of the two-process account proposed by Greene (1989).

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This study investigated how spaces between words affect reading of Japanese sentences. Eye movements were recorded during silent reading of the sentences. Two factors were varied: (1) kanji-kana mixed or hiragana only sentences and (2) presence or absence of spaces. Results showed that spaced hiragana only sentences were read faster and with fewer fixations and shorter gaze durations than unspaced sentences. In addition, first fixation positions in words of the spaced sentences were closer to optimal viewing position than those of the unspaced sentences. On the other hand, there was no significant difference in reading time and eye movement measures between reading of spaced kanji-kana mixed sentences and that of unspaced sentences. From these results, the functions of spaces in the reading of hiragana only sentences and those of kanji in the reading of kanji-kana mixed sentences were discussed.

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This study examined whether lexical knowledge affects on letter migration with Japanese Kana words. The participants were presented with two brief masked "source" words (e.g., いすりか) each made up of two components (letters), followed by a "probe" word (e.g., いか). The probe word in the critical trial was a blend of two letters, one each from the two source words. The stimuli were also prepared with numeric consisting of two digits (e.g., source: 13 96, probe: 16). The task of participants was to decide whether the probe was one of the source stimuli. The results indicated that the probability of a false recognition was higher for Kana words than for numeric when components in the probe maintained the position they took in the source items (local consistent). This suggests that not only positional consistency of word-components but also lexical knowledge affects the letter migration.

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Preexposure to stimuli facilitates performance of subsequent discrimination training with these stimuli, when the discrimination task is relatively difficult for animals. This perceptual learning effect indicates that the animals incidentally learn the natures of the preexposed stimuli. This paper gives a brief tutorial review on classical and recent studies of perceptual learning in animals. We also discussed some applications of the perceptual learning studies with animals to human cognitive studies such as other-race effect in face recognition.

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The Process-Dissociation Procedure (PDP) is one of the experimental methods used to prove that two memory processes, consciously controlled and automatic recollection processes, are working in parallel, and is also a method to estimate relative strengths of each processes. In this article, theoretical basis of the PDP were reviewed with several successful results in human memory experiments. After years of criticism and debates, the PDP has been evolved and its necessary conditions of applicability are now explicitly available. Focusing on the potential power of the PDP, which exists in its assumption of parallel mental processes, the method could be used in wide, different psychological research areas other than human memory. The applicability of the PDP as new research methods was also reviewed with some case examples.

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A study on gaze perception was described to exemplify image processing and presentation techniques that are useful for psychophysical experiments. We perceive another person's gaze direction accurately from straight ahead, but the perception becomes inaccurate when the person's head is turned. This error has been attributed to the misjudgment of the gaze itself, but the error could stem from another source. To examining such a possibility we conducted several experiments. First, we measured the accuracy of gaze-direction estimation for full-size color photographs with several gaze and head-turn angles presented on CRT. Results indicate that gaze perception is accurate from straight ahead, but that a small but systematic error occurs for stimuli with a head turn. Next, we had subjects evaluate head turns for similar stimuli, and found that the head turn is generally underestimated. The results suggest that the error in estimating gaze direction is caused by underestimation of head turn. This possibility was further tested by presenting synthesized images in which underestimation of head turns was compensated by adding more head turn while keeping the eyes the same. The error was dramatically decreased for these pictures.

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