Transfer of training

This chapter discusses the concept of transfer of training. Learning successive paired-associate lists in a laboratory is a far cry from the more global kinds of transfer effects that one might hope to understand in the world outside the laboratory. However, through carefully controlled experimentation, one may identify some of the principles and generalizations that will eventually help to understand the more complicated, relevant examples of everyday transfer. The basic transfer experiment involves two stages. The subject first learns one task and then attempts to master a second somewhat similar task. Within this simple, convenient framework, any number of variables may be manipulated. The chapter discusses the complex relationship between similarity and transfer. It also presents a clarification of the close relationship between generalization and the concept of transfer of training. Some of the theoretical issues concerning the mechanisms of transfer of training are also discussed in the chapter.