Concepts become more interrelated with practice under discriminate instructions, and more isolated with practice under image instructions¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · causal r1 · q3
Currency · newest study 1996 · checked against its sources 2026-10-20 (automated, 1 of 1 entry) · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q3 i? Discriminate-group concepts became significantly more interrelated with practice, with nondiagnostic feature influence dropping from 33% to 10% of diagnostic influence. → Goldstone 1996 q2 i? Image-group concepts showed a marginally significant trend toward greater isolation with practice. → Goldstone 1996

Evidence¶

Goldstone 1996¶

Goldstone, R. L. (1996). Isolated and interrelated concepts. Memory & Cognition, 24 (5), 608-628. https://doi.org/10.3758/bf03201087

q3 · i? · causal · r1

Trial-half analysis from Experiment 1's categorization task: for discriminate subjects the nondiagnostic slope fell from -3.57 to -0.039. The image-group trend was "marginally significant" [F(1,13) = 4.4, p < .06], so the isolation-increase claim is not fully confirmed.

"In contrast, concepts in the discriminate group became more interrelated with practice [F(1,13) = 5.50, MSe = 0.25,p < .05]."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Subjects given image instructions include more nondiagnostic features in their drawings of concepts than subjects given discriminate instructions — related
• Frequent alternation of categories yields more interrelated concepts than infrequent alternation, as indicated by a diagnosticity-by-alternation interaction — related
• Imagery instructions yield more isolated concepts than discriminating-feature instructions, as shown by greater influence of nondiagnostic features on categorization accuracy — related
• Whether a prototype or caricature is categorized more easily is predicted to depend on concept interrelatedness: prototype advantage for isolated, caricature advantage for interrelated concepts — related