The Research Of Knowledge Effects In The Similarity Judgment

Assessments of similarity seem to be important for a variety of cognitive acts,such as memory retrieval,categorization,decision making,problem solving,and reasoning.At present,similarity is widely used in the study of the classification,two of the most influential approaches to classification are similarity-based categorization and theory-based categorization.Similarity-based approaches focus abilities to detect and correlate perceptual and statistical information in their environment.In contrast,theory-based approaches highlight the salience of knowledge and intuitive theories regarding intentions,causality,and other non-obvious properties.The hypothesis that prior knowledge effects categorisation has found support in several empirical studies that tested for the effects of knowledge.However research rarely involves the relationship of the similarity and theoretical knowledge,and it is difficult to control individual knowledge experience.Therefore the present study used the virtual plant spores as experimental material,to investigate how theoretical knowledge influence on similarity judgment.In recent years,the researchers integrated similarity-based approaches and theory-based approaches,Classification is considered to the result of the similarity in concert with knowledge.But additional studies are needed to the relationship among knowledge,similarity and classification.If theoretical knowledge can affect the similarity,theoretical knowledge affects similarity directly or indirectly?Furthermore,the present study will explore.Study 1 investigated the effect of theoretical knowledge on the similarity judgment from cognitive results,Experiment 1 explored the similarity judgment in the absence of theoretical knowledge condition and theoretical knowledge condition,Experiment 2 studies the relationship between the effect of theoretical knowledge on the similarity judgment and classification task,stimuli-presenting mode.In study 2,we used the eye tracking methods from cognitive process to explore the action mechanism of the effect of theoretical knowledge on the similarity judgment,and the effect of classification task on the similarity judgment in the absence of theoretical knowledge condition and theoretical knowledge condition.The findings of the two studies are as follows:(1)For the material of low characteristics difference perception and knowledge Linkages,the values of similarity judgment in the absence of theoretical knowledge condition were significantly higher than that in theoretical knowledge condition.For the material of high characteristics difference perception and knowledge Linkages,the values of similarity judgment in theoretical knowledge condition were significantly higher than that in the absence of theoretical knowledge condition.The eye movement data showed the rate of total dwell time and the rate number of fixations in theoretical knowledge condition were significantly higher than that in the absence of theoretical knowledge condition.(2)Whether it is the absence of knowledge condition or theory knowledge condition,the level of similarity judgment showed no significant difference on different types of materials with classification task or without classification task.The eyetracking data of similarity judgment showed the main effect of classification task was't significant.(3)Whether it is the absence of knowledge condition or theory knowledge condition,the first fixation duration and gaze duration showed no significant difference between similarity judgment and classification.(4)In the absence of theoretical knowledge,the level of similarity judgment in context were significantly higher than that in non-context for the material of low characteristics difference perception and knowledge Linkages.In the theoretical knowledge condition,the level of similarity judgment showed no significant difference between two stimuli-presenting modes.Following conclusions are made:(1)The theoretical knowledge can impact on similarity judgment.If the perceptual similarity and theoretical knowledge act on similarity judgment at the same time,people tend to make decisions according to theoretical knowledge,and the influence of theoretical knowledge is in the post processing of similarity judgment.(2)The classification task doesn't affect the similarity judgment in the absence of knowledge condition or theoretical knowledge condition,which implies the theoretical knowledge can directly act on the similarity,then act on the classification by similarity.(3)Whether it is the absence of knowledge condition or theory knowledge condition,the early processing of similarity judgment and classification may exist similarity comparison.Therefore it is not contradictory between similarity-based categorization and theory-based categorization.In fact theory-based categorization are based on similarity in essence,there is similarity comparison in knowledge effects of classification.(4)Similarity comparisons are highly sensitive to judgment context in the absence of theoretical knowledge,the experiment showed the effect of similarity perception.But there wasn't similarity perception effect in theoretical knowledge condition.The results showed the influence of judgment context only exists in low levels of perceptual processing,judgment context doesn't influence deep processing.