Statistical learning research: A critical review and possible new directions.
Date
2019Author
Frost, Ram
Armstrong, Blair C.
Christiansen, Morten H.
Metadata
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Frost, R., Armstrong, B. C., & Christiansen, M. H. (2019). Statistical learning research: A critical review and possible new directions. Psychological Bulletin, 145(12), 1128–1153. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000210
Abstract
Statistical learning (SL) is involved in a wide range of basic and higher-order cognitive functions and is
taken to be an important building block of virtually all current theories of information processing. In the
last 2 decades, a large and continuously growing research community has therefore focused on the ability
to extract embedded patterns of regularity in time and space. This work has mostly focused on transitional
probabilities, in vision, audition, by newborns, children, adults, in normal developing and clinical
populations. Here we appraise this research approach and we critically assess what it has achieved, what
it has not, and why it is so. We then center on present SL research to examine whether it has adopted
novel perspectives. These discussions lead us to outline possible blueprints for a novel research agenda.