Blocking and Stimulus Modality in CEE: difficulties in teaching with pictograms

It has been observed that the use of pictures interferes when teaching novel words. We sought to extend these results to Stimulus Equivalence Classes (SEC), investigating whether the blocking effect occurs differentially according to the modality of the blocked stimulus (i.e. pictorial or pseudo-lexical). Ten university students were trained, by matching to sample, in four SEC (two of pseudo-lexical modality and two of pictorial modality). A blocking procedure was applied during the same training. Emergence of derived relationships for each element of the compound stimuli was separately evaluated. A greater blocking effect was observed whenever the blocking stimulus X was of pseudo-lexical modality. Results are discussed regarding associative theories, as well as its implications in the development of pedagogical practices. The results observed discourage the use of images in compound stimuli for the teaching of novel words