Conceptual Anchoring Dissociates Implicit and Explicit Category Learning

Categorization researchers have long debated the possibility of multiple category-learning systems. The need persists for paradigms that dissociate explicit-declarative category-learning processes (featuring verbalizable category rules) from implicit-procedural processes (featuring stimulus-response associations lying beneath declarative cognition). The authors contribute a new paradigm, using perfectly matched exclusive-or (XOR) category tasks differing only in the availability or absence of easily verbalizable conceptual content. This manipulation transformed learning. The conceptual task alone was learned suddenly, by insightful rule discovery, producing explicit-declarative XOR knowledge. The perceptual task was learned more gradually, consistent with associative-learning processes, producing impoverished declarative knowledge. We also tested participants under regimens of immediate and deferred reinforcement. The conceptual task alone was learned through processes that survive the loss of trial-by-trial reinforcement. All results support the idea that humans have perceptual-associative processes for implicit learning, but also an overlain conceptual system that under the right circumstances constitutes a parallel explicit-declarative category-learning system.