Acquisition of cognitive skill.

By Anderson, John R.
Psychological Review, Vol 89(4), Jul 1982, 369-406.
Abstract
Proposes a framework for skill acquisition that includes 2 major stages in the development
of a cognitive skill: (1) a declarative stage in which facts about the skill domain are
interpreted and (2) a procedural stage in which the domain knowledge is directly embodied
in procedures for performing the skill. This general framework has been instantiated in the
ACT system in which facts are encoded in a propositional network and procedures are
encoded as productions. Knowledge compilation is the process by which the skill transits
from the declarative stage to the procedural stage. It consists of the subprocesses of
composition, which collapses sequences of productions into single productions, and
proceduralization, which embeds factual knowledge into productions. Once proceduralized,
further learning processes operate on the skill to make the productions more selective in
their range of applications. These processes include generalization, discrimination, and
strengthening of productions. Comparisons are made to similar concepts from previous
learning theories. How these learning mechanisms apply to produce the power law speedup
in processing time with practice is discussed. (62 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012
APA, all rights reserved)