The role of enactment in implicit and explicit memory

Enactment during the encoding of simple imperatives has been found to improve substantially performance on conceptually driven explicit-memory tests. In two experiments the effect of this manipulation on a conceptually driven implicit test (category association) was studied. A conceptually driven explicit test (free recall) was also included. In Experiment one three different study conditions (enactment with real objects, reading, and generation) were considered. In Experiment two there were two study conditions (enactment with imaginary objects and reading). Compared to reading, generation was found to improve the performance on both free recall and category association, whereas enactment affected free recall only. In a final experiment subjects imagined that they performed the tasks, and this manipulation was found to improve the memory performance on both tests. Taken together, this pattern of results is interpreted as suggesting that free recall and category association have a process in common that is sensitive to semantic processing at study (promoted by generation and imagery, but not by enactment), and that free recall involves a retrieval process in addition that is facilitated by a rich encoding environment (provided by enactment).     

Generation and priming effects in word-fragment completion.

Priming effects in word-fragment completion were enhanced when at study subjects generated rather than read the words. This generation effect occurred when the same fragments used at test were also used in generating the words at study. When different fragments were used at study and at test, generate and read conditions gave rise to similiar priming effects, but these same study conditions led to typical generation effects in recognition memory. These findings of a generation effect in an implicit as opposed to an explicit memory test support the view that generating a study item may enhance data-driven as well as conceptually driven processing, and they provide further evidence of the usefulness of this process distinction in relating implicit to explicit memory performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Component processes and the utility of the conceptually-driven/data-driven distinction.

Three experiments tested the conceptually driven/data-driven distinction as an account of memory dissociations. Exp 1 found that cue typicality had opposite effects on semantic cued recall and category verification, yet performance on both of these conceptually driven tasks was best when the study and test cues matched. In Exps 2a and 2b, graphemic cued recall and fragment completion (both data-driven) were compared with semantic cued recall. Cued recall performance was best when the test cues resembled the study cues, but fragment completion priming did not vary. Exp 3 found opposite effects of frequency on fragment completion and graphemic cued recall. Moreover, the similarity of study cues to their targets affected only graphemic cued recall. These results are consistent with the general transfer-appropriate processing framework but not with the conceptually driven/data-driven distinction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conceptual priming in fragment completion.

Some researchers have claimed that fragment completion tasks are dependent primarily on data-driven processing and are insensitive to conceptually driven processing. In this article we present four experiments demonstrating that conceptually driven processing affects fragment completion by showing that under appropriate conditions, studied words can facilitate identification of their picture and word fragments. We examine two theoretical explanations of this effect. First, we consider the possibility that subjects explicitly retrieve episodic representations in fragment completion. Analyses of correlations between priming and recall performance across items and subjects do not support this explanation. The alternative explanation is that there are two separate conceptual representations in memory. The first is assumed to mediate conceptual priming in fragment completion; the second is assumed to mediate free recall performance. A final experiment supports this view by demonstrating that even when differences between experimental conditions are made to disappear in fragment completion, they remain in free recall. Further applications of the notion of two semantic representations are discussed in the General Discussion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A comparison of study strategies for passages: Rereading, answering questions, and generating questions.

Students are often encouraged to generate and answer their own questions on to-be-remembered material, because this interactive process is thought to enhance memory. But does this strategy actually work? In three experiments, all participants read the same passage, answered questions, and took a test to get accustomed to the materials in a practice phase. They then read three passages and did one of three tasks on each passage: reread the passage, answered questions set by the experimenter, or generated and answered their own questions. Passages were 575-word (Experiments 1 and 2) or 350-word (Experiment 3) texts on topics such as Venice, the Taj Mahal, and the singer Cesaria Evora. After each task, participants predicted their performance on a later test, which followed the same format as the practice phase test (a short-answer test in Experiments 1 and 2, and a free recall test in Experiment 3). In all experiments, best performance was predicted after generating and answering questions. We show, however, that generating questions led to no improvement over answering comprehension questions, but that both of these tasks were more beneficial than rereading. This was the case on an immediate short-answer test (Experiment 1), a short-answer test taken 2 days after study (Experiment 2), and an immediate free recall test (Experiment 3). Generating questions took at least twice as long as answering questions in all three experiments, so although it is a viable alternative to answering questions in the absence of materials, it is less time-efficient. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Generation effects in frequency judgment.

The generation effect is the advantage in memory for information that is self-produced, rather than read. Seven experiments studied this effect on tasks requiring memory for frequency of occurrence. Generation effects were found on both relative and absolute frequency judgment and for both rhyming and letter-switching generation tasks. No generation effect was found on items at the lowest true frequency, when repetitions were massed, when nonwords were used as stimuli, or when subjects were given accurate frequency information during list presentation. These results are discussed in terms of a multiple-trace account of frequency information. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Concrete words are easier to recall than abstract words: Evidence for a semantic contribution to short-term serial recall.

Immediate serial recall and maximal speech rate were assessed for concrete and abstract words differing in length. Experiment 1 showed large advantages for spoken recall of concrete words that were independent of speech rate. Experiment 2 showed an equivalent effect with written, rather than spoken, recall. Experiment 3 showed that the concreteness effect was still present when recall was backward rather than forward. In all 3 experiments, concrete words enjoyed an advantage that was roughly constant across all serial positions (with the possible exception of the 1st and last items). Experiment 4 used a matching-span procedure and showed that when there was no requirement for linguistic output, the effect of concreteness (but not the effect of word length) was eliminated. It is argued that semantic coding exerts powerful effects in verbal short-term memory tasks that have generally been underestimated. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The influence of levels of processing on recall from working memory and delayed recall tasks.

Recent research in working memory has highlighted the similarities involved in retrieval from complex span tasks and episodic memory tasks, suggesting that these tasks are influenced by similar memory processes. In the present article, the authors manipulated the level of processing engaged when studying to-be-remembered words during a reading span task (Experiment 1) and an operation span task (Experiment 2) in order to assess the role of retrieval from secondary memory during complex span tasks. Immediate recall from both span tasks was greater for items studied under deep processing instructions compared with items studied under shallow processing instructions regardless of trial length. Recall was better for deep than for shallow levels of processing on delayed recall tests as well. These data are consistent with the primary-secondary memory framework, which suggests that to-be-remembered items are displaced from primary memory (i.e., the focus of attention) during the processing phases of complex span tasks and therefore must be retrieved from secondary memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Metamemory judgments and the benefits of repeated study: Improving recall predictions through the activation of appropriate knowledge.

Correspondence between judgments of learning (JOLs) and actual recall tends to be poor when the same items are studied and recalled multiple times (e.g., A. Koriat, L. Sheffer, & H. Ma’ayan, 2002). The authors investigated whether making relevant metamemory knowledge more salient would improve the association between actual and predicted recall as a function of repeated exposure to the same study list. In 2 experiments, participants completed 4 study–recall phases involving the same list of items. In addition to having participants make item-by-item JOLs during each study phase, after the 1st study–recall phase participants also generated change-in-recall estimates as to how many more or fewer words they would recall given another exposure to the same study list. This estimation procedure was designed to highlight repeated study as a factor that can contribute to recall performance. Activating metamemory knowledge about the benefits of repeated study for recall in this way allowed participants to accurately express this knowledge in a free-recall context (Experiment 2), but less so when the memory test was cued recall (Experiment 1). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Level-of-processing effects in conceptually driven implicit tasks.

Level of processing (LOP) has often been shown to affect performance on explicit memory tasks, but not on implicit memory tasks. These findings have been explained by the processing framework (H. J. Roediger et al, 1989): Study–test transfer depends on the overlap between the type of processing at study and at test. This framework predicts that conceptually driven implicit (CDI) memory tasks should be affected by an LOP manipulation because the study and test tasks share common conceptual processes. This prediction was investigated with 2 CDI tasks: general knowledge retrieval and category exemplar generation. LOP effects were found in both tasks, thus supporting the processing framework. Category exemplar priming declined rapidly over a 90-min interval, and elaborative study conditions enhanced the duration of priming relative to physical conditions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Breakfast, blood glucose, and cognition

This article compares the findings of three studies that explored the role of increased blood glucose in improving memory function for subjects who ate breakfast. An initial improvement in memory function for these subjects was found to correlate with blood glucose concentrations. In subsequent studies, morning fasting was found to adversely affect the ability to recall a word list and a story read aloud, as well as recall items while counting backwards. Failure to eat breakfast did not affect performance on an intelligence test. It was concluded that breakfast consumption preferentially influences tasks requiring aspects of memory. In the case of both word list recall and memory while counting backwards, the decline in performance associated with not eating breakfast was reversed by the consumption of a glucose-supplemented drink. Although a morning fast also affected the ability to recall a story read aloud, the glucose drink did not reverse this decline. It appears that breakfast consumption influences cognition via several mechanisms, including an increase in blood glucose.     

Visual and spatial working memory are not that dissociated after all: A time-based resource-sharing account.

Examinations of interference between visual and spatial materials in working memory have suggested domain- and process-based fractionations of visuo-spatial working memory. The present study examined the role of central time-based resource sharing in visuo-spatial working memory and assessed its role in obtained interference patterns. Visual and spatial storage were combined with both visual and spatial on-line processing components in computer-paced working memory span tasks (Experiment 1) and in a selective interference paradigm (Experiment 2). The cognitive load of the processing components was manipulated to investigate its impact on concurrent maintenance for both within-domain and between-domain combinations of processing and storage components. In contrast to both domain- and process-based fractionations of visuo-spatial working memory, the results revealed that recall performance was determined by the cognitive load induced by the processing of items, rather than by the domain to which those items pertained. These findings are interpreted as evidence for a time-based resource-sharing mechanism in visuo-spatial working memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Differential effects of aging and Alzheimer's disease on conceptual implicit and explicit memory.

The effects of aging and Alzheimer's disease (AD) on conceptual explicit and implicit memory were examined. Three groups of participants patients with AD; age-matched, older control participants; and younger control participants made deep (semantic) or shallow (nonsemantic) judgments about low-dominant category exemplars. Explicit memory was measured by category cued recall and implicit memory was measured by priming on a category-exemplar generation task. Younger participants had enhanced cued recall and priming following deep, relative to shallow, encoding; this indicated that both memory measures were conceptually driven. Aging reduced explicit, but not implicit, test performance, and it did not reduce conceptually driven processes for either test. In contrast, AD reduced explicit and implicit test performance, and it impaired conceptually driven memory processes for both tests. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of perceptual and conceptual processing on memory for words and voice: different patterns for young and old

In two experiments younger and older adults listened to a list of words presented auditorily by two speakers. The subjects processed each word either perceptually (voice judgements) or conceptually (pleasantness judgements), and were then given memory tasks for the words and the presenting voice. In the word-recognition task the two age groups benefited equally from conceptual as opposed to perceptual processing. In the voice memory task, however, conceptual processing improved performance relative to perceptual processing in the younger subjects (significantly so in Experiment 1), but conceptual processing was associated with decreased performance in the older group (significantly so in Experiment 2). These results suggest that whereas older subjects exhibit a trade-off in memory for item and attribute information, younger subjects exhibit a pattern of support, in which conceptual processing benefits memory for both items and their attributes.     

Conversation memory: The effects of speaker status on memory for the assertiveness of conversation remarks.

We conducted three experiments to examine the effects of information about a speaker's status on memory for the assertiveness of his or her remarks. Subjects either read (Experiments 1 and 2) or listened to a conversation (Experiment 3) and were later tested for their memory of the target speaker's remarks with either a recognition (Experiment 1) or a recall procedure (Experiments 2 and 3). In all experiments the target speaker's ostensible status was manipulated. In Experiment 1, subjects who believed the speaker was high in status were less able later to distinguish between remarks from the conversation and assertive paraphrases of those remarks. This result was replicated in Experiment 2, but only when the status information was provided before subjects read the conversation and not when the information was provided after the conversation had been read. Experiment 2's results eliminate a reconstructive memory interpretation and suggest that information about a speaker's status affects the encoding of remarks. Experiment 3 examined this effect in a more ecologically representative context. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Biases in interpretation and memory in generalized social phobia.

Two experiments examined the link between interpretation and memory in individuals diagnosed with Generalized Social Phobia (GSP). In Experiment 1, GSP and control participants generated continuations for nonsocial and ambiguous social scenarios. GSP participants produced more socially anxious and negative continuations for the social scenarios than did the controls. On the subsequent test of recalling the social scenarios, intrusion errors that shared meaning with the original continuations were made more frequently by the GSP group, producing false recall with emotionally negative features. To examine whether nonanxious individuals would also produce such errors if given emotional interpretations, in Experiment 2 the authors asked university students to read the scenarios plus endings produced by GSP participants in Experiment 1. The students either constructed vivid mental images of themselves as the main characters or thought about whether the endings provided closure. Low-anxious students in the closure condition produced fewer ending-based intrusions in recalling the social scenarios than did students in the other 3 conditions. Results illustrate the importance of examining the nature of source-monitoring errors in investigations of memory biases in social anxiety. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Retrieval from semantic memory and its implications for Alzheimer's disease.

In 3 experiments, participants generated category exemplars (e.g., kinds of fruits) while a voice key and computer recorded each response latency relative to the onset of responding. In Experiment 1, mean response latency was faster when participants generated exemplars from smaller categories, suggesting that smaller mental search sets result in faster mean latencies. In Experiment 2, a concurrent secondary task increased mean response latency, suggesting that slowed mental processing results in slower mean latencies. In Experiment 3, the mean response latency of Alzheimer's participants was faster than that of elderly controls, which is consistent with the idea that the semantic memory impairments of Alzheimer's disease patients stem primarily from a reduction in available items (as in Experiment 1) rather than retrieval slowing (as in Experiment 2). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Using Recall to Reduce False Recognition: Diagnostic and Disqualifying Monitoring.

Whether recall of studied words (e.g., parsley, rosemary, thyme) could reduce false recognition of related lures (e.g., basil) was investigated. Subjects studied words from several categories for a final recognition memory test. Half of the subjects were given standard test instructions, and half were instructed to use recall to reduce false recognition. Manipulation checks indicated that the latter instructions did elicit a recall-to-reject strategy. However, false recognition was selectively reduced only when all the words from a category could be recalled (Experiment 1). When longer categories were used, thereby minimizing exhaustive recall, a recall-to-reject strategy was ineffective at reducing false recognition (Experiment 2). It is suggested that exhaustively recalling a category allowed subjects to disqualify the lure as having occurred, analogous to recall-to-reject demonstrations in other tasks. In contrast, partially recalling a category did not help to diagnose the lure as nonstudied. These findings constrain theories of recall-based monitoring processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of integration in recognition failure and action memory

In three experiments, we studied memory for action events with respect to exceptions from the Tulving-Wiseman function demonstrated in experiments on recognition failure of recallable words. In Experiment 1, we examined exceptions of poor integration in a regular recognition failure condition (i.e., recognition of targets without contextual cues, followed by recall of targets in the presence of contextual cues). In Experiment 2, we examined exceptions of cue overlap in which subjects also had access to the information of contextual cues at recognition test. In Experiment 3, we attempted to equate the levels of recognition across the action and verbal encoding. In addition, the cue overlap and no-cue overlap conditions were studied in a within-subjects design. Results from the three experiments indicated that encoding enactment (episodic integration) and conceptual integration (semantic integration) are related to each other. As a consequence of this relationship, there is a larger independence between recognition and recall of well-integrated items with encoding enactment. On the other hand, for the poorly integrated items without encoding enactment, there is a larger dependence between recognition and recall. Even in the cue overlap condition, where there is a case of large dependence between recognition and recall, the same pattern of data was observed. The results are discussed in terms of an episodic integration view of encoding enactment.     

La validité du sentiment de savoir au rappel et à la reconnaissance.

Describes feeling of knowing (FOK), which consists of 3 phases: (1) Ss' knowledge is tested, usually with a recall test. (2) Ss predict subsequent memory performance on items that were not recalled. (3) Accuracy of FOK predictions is evaluated against a criterion test. The present study determined whether similar results would be obtained when all items were considered, instead of only those having previously led to recall failure, and compared the predictive accuracy of individual FOK with that of average FOK and average item difficulty in different memory tasks. Results showed individual FOK to be a poor predictor of performance in forced-choice recognition tasks. Gammas increased when the validity of individual FOK was computed over all items. However, the validity of the other predictors also increased, so that average item difficulty remained the best predictor of performance in recognition tasks. (French & English abstracts) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)