ABSTRACT
Implicit learning has been characterized as an unconscious process by which knowledge is acquired without a deliberate attempt to learn. Its converse, explicit learning, occurs when there is active engagement in conscious strategies to discover the rules underlying a task. Other purported characteristics of implicit learning are that it is unselective, storing all contingencies between stimulus variables, and that it is not capacity limited. By contrast, explicit learning utilizes only those variables selectively maintained in a limited-capacity working memory (Berry & D.E. Broadbent, 1988; D.E. Broadbent, 1989; Hayes & D.E. Broadbent, 1988). It also has been argued (Reber, 1992) that implicit learning predates the evolution of explicit learning; consequently, implicit compared to explicit learning should be more robust to neuropsychological insult. These aspects of implicit learning form the focus of this chapter. Other aspects of implicit learning that Reber derived from his position on evolution, but that are not examined here, include the suggestion that implicit learning should have a narrower population variance, and emerge earlier in the child and be less related to age, than explicit learning (see chap. 9 of this volume for further discussion of developmental issues in implicit learning), and that implicit learning should be independent of IQ, and exhibit interspecies commonalities.
