Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Table of Contents - 2009 - Volume 32, Issue 02  

Cambridge Journals Online - CUP Full-Text Page
Behavioral and Brain Sciences (2009), 32:199-200 Cambridge University Press
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009
doi:10.1017/S0140525X09000879

Open Peer Commentary

Propositional learning is a useful research heuristic but it is not a theoretical algorithm

A. G. Bakera1, Irina Baetua1 and Robin A. Murphya2

a1 Department of Psychology, McGill University, Montréal, Québec, H3A 1B1, Canada andy.baker@mcgill.ca http://www.psych.mcgill.ca/faculty/abaker.html irina.baetu@mail.mcgill.ca
a2 Cognitive Perceptual and Brain Sciences Unit, Division of Psychology and Language Sciences, University College London, London, WC1E 6BT, United Kingdom. robin.murphy@ucl.ac.uk
Article author query
baker ag [PubMed]  [Google Scholar]
baetu i [PubMed]  [Google Scholar]
murphy ra [PubMed]  [Google Scholar]

Abstract

Mitchell et al.'s claim, that their propositional theory is a single-process theory, is illusory because they relegate some learning to a secondary memory process. This renders the single-process theory untestable. The propositional account is not a process theory of learning, but rather, a heuristic that has led to interesting research.

The propositional nature of human associative learning Chris J. Mitchell, Jan De Houwer and Peter F. Lovibond School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Kensington 2052, Australia chris.mitchell@unsw.edu.au http://www.psy.unsw.edu.au/profiles/cmitchell.html; Department of Psychology, Ghent University, Henri Dunantlaan 2, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium jan.dehouwer@ugent.be http://users.ugent.be/~jdhouwer/">; School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Kensington 2052, Australia p.lovibond@unsw.edu.au http://www.psy.unsw.edu.au/profiles/plovibond.html">