概念識別におよぼす言語命名の効果を規定している要因を明らかにすることを目的として,2つの実験が企てられた。 実験Iでは,命名語の熟知性を検討するために命名語として熟知語と非熟知語が用いられ,刺激図形として無意味図形が用いられた。その結果,熟知性の程度による言語命名の効果の違いは認められなかった。しかし,課題遂行後の内省報告においては熟知語の方が非熟知語よりも分類理由としてより多く報告された。 実験IIでは,命名される刺激次元(適切・不適切)の種類,および命名語の刺激図形に対する適合性の2つの要因について同時に検討した。刺激は無意味図形であるが,色,形の次元によって変化する図形でもあった。その結果,適切次元への言語命名は不適切次元への言語命名に比べて概念識別学習を促進することが実証された。また,命名語と刺激の適合性については有意な差がみいだされなかった。 一般に概念的行動においては事物や事象に名辞を与える段階(符号化),それを利用して範疇化を行なう段階(符号の利用),範疇化を言語的に表現する段階(その符号の言語化)の3段階が認められ,本研究で実証された言語命名の効果を論じる場合にも,これらの段階と関連づけて考察された。すなわち,命名語の刺激に対する適合性は符号化に,命名刺激次元の種類は符号化の利用に,命名語の熟知性は符号の言語化にそれぞれ関与することが述べられた。

Two experiments were conducted to examine the following three factors determining the effects of verbal labelling on the concept identification: Exp. I for the factor of familiarity to label, Exp. II for the factors of the variety of stimulus dimension to be labelled and the compatibility between sensory impressions of the label and stimulus features. In Exp. I, 90 second-grade children were divided into three groups. The Ss in Group 1 learned to associate familiar words (e.g, IE, MICHI) with the corresponding stimulus figures. These were nonsense figures which did not contain any dimensional features. The Ss in Group 2 learned to associate unfamiliar words (e.g. KAOKU, GAIRO) with the same stimulus as used in Group 1. The Ss in Group 3 (control group) were required to count the number every time when the nonsense figures were presented. Immediately after the task mentioned above, all Ss were required to identify the nonsense figures on the basis of the verbal cues acquired in the labelling task, and then reported verbal introspectations. In Exp. II, 80 third-grade children took part and each S was assigned to one of the eight conditions. The experimental method in Exp. II was the same as in Exp. I, except the stimulus materials. The stimulus materials consisted of non sense figures varied with two colors (red and blue) and with two forms (round and angular). The labelling words consisted of familiar common nouns which were classified in terms of sensory impressions, i.e, "post" for red, "sky" for blue, "egg" for round and "horn" for angular. The 2×2×2 factorial design was used: two tasks (color or form identification task), two kinds of the stimulus di mension to be labelled (relevant or irrelevant di mension of the identification task) and two compatibilities between the sensory impressions of the label and attributs of stimulus figure (compatible or unrelated). The main results were as follows: (a) No significant differences in the identification performance were found between familiar label and unfamiliar label conditions (Exp. I), and between compatible label and unrelated label conditions (Exp. II). (b) It was shown, however, that the labelling procedures for the relevant dimension improved the identification performance more than for irrelevant dimension (Exp. II). (c) Further, the familiarity to labels increased the introspective reports of labels learned (Exp. I). The compatibility between labels and figures had effects on the speed of labelling learning (EXP. II). These results were discussed with reference to the three stages of conceptual behavior.