Examining the relationship between free recall and immediate serial recall: The effects of list length and output order.

In 4 experiments, participants were presented with lists of between 1 and 15 words for tests of immediate memory. For all tasks, participants tended to initiate recall with the first word on the list for short lists. As the list length was increased, so there was a decreased tendency to start with the first list item; and, when free to do so, participants showed an increased tendency to start with one of the last 4 list items. In all tasks, the start position strongly influenced the shape of the resultant serial position curves: When recall started at Serial Position 1, elevated recall of early list items was observed; when recall started toward the end of the list, there were extended recency effects. These results occurred under immediate free recall (IFR) and different variants of immediate serial recall (ISR) and reconstruction of order (RoO) tasks. We argue that these findings have implications for the relationship between IFR and ISR and between rehearsal and recall. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Temporal contexts: Filling the gap between episodic memory and associative learning.

People can create temporal contexts, or episodes, and stimuli that belong to the same context can later be used to retrieve the memory of other events that occurred at the same time. This can occur in the absence of direct contingency and contiguity between the events, which poses a challenge to associative theories of learning and memory. Because this is a learning and memory problem, we propose an integrated approach. Theories of temporal contexts developed in the memory tradition provide interesting predictions that we test using the methods of associative learning to assess their generality and applicability to different settings and dependent variables. In 4 experiments, the integration of these 2 areas allows us to show that (a) participants spontaneously create temporal contexts in the absence of explicit instructions; (b) cues can be used to retrieve an old temporal context and the information associated with other cues that were trained in that context; and (c) the memory of a retrieved temporal context can be updated with information from the current situation that does not fit well with the retrieved memory, thereby helping participants to best adapt their behavior to the future changes of the environment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Serial list linking by macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta): List property limitations.

Four sophisticated macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta) learned 6 different, 15-item ordinal lists (via conditional, 2-choice discriminations) as part of a study assessing some properties of serial list memory in monkeys. After assuring that the first 3 lists were well retained, the researchers attempted to link these by training only the 2 end-item pairs that ordered all 45 items into an inclusive series. A 20-day test of possible pairings among these 45 items was then conducted. Subsequently, the other 3 lists were trained and tested for retention, but no link training was provided. Then, a test like the one that had followed linking was administered. Unlike previous outcomes with three 5-item lists, linking did not yield immediate merger of three 15-item lists into a 45-item list, although 45-item lists were acquired after sufficient exposure to the testing/training regimen under both linking and nonlinking conditions. List length as a limiting factor in linking suggested processing restrictions analogous to those observed in human list memory. Results supported further investigation of list-linking characteristics. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A spatial modality effect in serial memory.

In 2 experiments, the authors tested whether the classical modality effect--that is, the stronger recency effect for auditory items relative to visual items--can be extended to the spatial domain. An order reconstruction task was undertaken with four types of material: visual-spatial, auditory-spatial, visual-verbal, and auditory-verbal. Similar serial position curves were obtained regardless of the nature of the to-be-remembered sequences, with the exception that a modality effect was found with spatial as well as with verbal materials. The results are discussed with regard to a number of models of short-term memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Equivalent effects of grouping by time, voice, and location on response timing in verbal serial memory.

The grouping of list items is known to improve serial memory accuracy and constrain the nature of temporal errors. A recent study (M. T. Maybery, F. B. R. Parmentier, & D. M. Jones, 2002) showed that grouping results in a temporal organization of the participants' responses that mimics the list structure but not the timing of its presentation. Here the authors tested the prediction that the temporal grouping of responses should yield the same pattern of response time (RT) irrespective of the method of grouping at presentation. Comparing temporal, location, and voice grouping, the results show that although these methods impact on recall accuracy to varying degrees, all 3 conditions produce significant and equivalent peaks in RT at the first position of each group. The RT data were accurately simulated through a model based on ACT-R's (J. R. Anderson & M. Matessa, 1997) basic principles. Altogether, the data suggest that the temporal organization of responses in verbal serial recall results from (a) declarative knowledge about the list's structure that is independent of the perceptual means by which grouping is induced at presentation and (b) the level of activation of the items per se. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The associative deficit in older adult memory: Recognition of pairs is not improved by repetition.

This study used a novel experimental paradigm that combined associative recognition and list discrimination to study the associative deficit in older adults’ memory (M. Naveh-Benjamin, 2000). Participants viewed 2 lists of word–face pairs and were tested on recognition of pairs from the second study list. Older and young adults’ recognition was increased by repetition of individual items, but repetition of pairs of items increased recognition in young adults only. This provides converging evidence that older adults do not form associative links between items within pairs and supports the hypothesis that an associative deficit contributes to age-related memory decline. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

When distractors and to-be-remembered items compete for the control of action: A new perspective on serial memory for spatial information.

In serial memory for spatial information, performance is impaired when distractors are interpolated between to-be-remembered (TBR) stimuli (Tremblay, Nicholls, Parmentier, & Jones, 2005). The so-called sandwich effect, combined with the use of eye tracking, served as a tool for examining the role of the oculomotor system in serial memory for spatial information. Participants had to recall the order in which sequences of TBR locations were presented. In some trials, to-be-ignored blue dots were presented after each TBR location. Our results show that response locations shift toward the location of the distractors, and this deviation is related to the eye movement deviation toward the distractor location. These results suggest that TBR and to-be-ignored locations are encoded onto a common map that could lie within the oculomotor system. Interference in memory for spatial information is interpreted in light of a model of oculomotor behavior (Godijn & Theeuwes, 2002b). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ease of access to list items in short-term memory depends on the order of the recognition probes.

We report data from 4 experiments using a recognition design with multiple probes to be matched to specific study positions. Items could be accessed rapidly, independent of set size, when the test order matched the study order (forward condition). When the order of testing was random, backward, or in a prelearned irregular sequence (reordered conditions), the classic Sternberg result was obtained: Response times were slow and increased linearly with set size. A number of explanations for forward-condition facilitation were ruled out, such as the predictability of the study order (Experiment 2), the predictability of the probe order (Experiment 1), the covariation of study and test orders (Experiments 1, 2, and 4), processes of probe encoding and perception that did not rely on STM access (Experiments 1, 2, and 4), specific support of the forward condition by articulatory processes (Experiment 3), or condition-dependent strategic differences (Experiment 4). More detailed analyses demonstrated that fast forward responses could not be accounted for by the effects of input position and output position that modulated random responses, effects that did account for the slower responses of the reordered conditions (Experiments 1, 3, and 4). A final analysis of probe-to-probe transitions as a function of encoding distance revealed a sizeable single-step benefit in the random condition. We concluded that STM representations were serial rather than spatial and that forward probes benefited from their serial adjacency. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Multiple roles for time in short-term memory: Evidence from serial recall of order and timing.

Three experiments are reported that examine the relationship between short-term memory for time and order information, and the more specific claim that order memory is driven by a timing signal. Participants were presented with digits spaced irregularly in time and postcued (Experiments 1 and 2) or precued (Experiment 3) to recall the order or timing of the digits. The primary results of interest were as follows: (a) Instructing participants to group lists had similar effects on serial and timing recall in inducing a pause in recall between suggested groups; (b) the timing of recall was predicted by the timing of the input lists in both serial recall and timing recall; and (c) when the recall task was precued, there was a tendency for temporally isolated items to be more accurately recalled than temporally crowded items. The results place constraints on models of serial recall that assume a timing signal generates positional representations and suggest an additional role for information about individual durations in short-term memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hypnotic age regression: A test of the functional ablation hypothesis.

The hypothesis that responses acquired after the time to which S is hypnotically age regressed are functionally ablated was tested by utilizing a modification of the retroactive interference paradigm with a paired associates task. 5 preselected female Ss learned List A (S1-R1). 2 wk. later they learned List B (S1-R2) whereupon they were hypnotically age regressed to the date of original learning, when R1 strength was high, and given further S1-R1 trials. Appropriate A-A and A-B-A comparison groups (N = 10 each) were employed. The findings that the hypnotic age regression procedures failed to preclude the occurrence of interlist intrusions in the relearning of S1-R1 does not support the hypothesis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Verbal working memory and language production: Common approaches to the serial ordering of verbal information.

[Correction Notice: An erratum for this article was reported in Vol 136(3) of Psychological Bulletin (see record 2010-07936-010). In the article “Verbal Working Memory and Language Production: Common Approaches to the Serial Ordering of Verbal Information” by Daniel J. Acheson and Maryellen C. MacDonald (Psychological Bulletin, 2009, Vol. 135, No. 1, pp. 50–68), the initial sentence of the text of the article (p. 50) contains an error. The first name of the researcher Andrew W. Ellis was listed incorrectly. The sentence should read as follows: Nearly 30 years ago, Andrew W. Ellis (1980) observed that errors on tests of verbal working memory (WM) paralleled those that occur naturally in speech production.] Verbal working memory (WM) tasks typically involve the language production architecture for recall; however, language production processes have had a minimal role in theorizing about WM. A framework for understanding verbal WM results is presented here. In this framework, domain-specific mechanisms for serial ordering in verbal WM are provided by the language production architecture, in which positional, lexical, and phonological similarity constraints are highly similar to those identified in the WM literature. These behavioral similarities are paralleled in computational modeling of serial ordering in both fields. The role of long-term learning in serial ordering performance is emphasized, in contrast to some models of verbal WM. Classic WM findings are discussed in terms of the language production architecture. The integration of principles from both fields illuminates the maintenance and ordering mechanisms for verbal information. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stimulus context effects, associative strength, and word frequency as determiners of free recall in paired-associate learning.

Two levels of response word frequency and three levels of associative strength of paired-associates were used to form six lists. One level of low associative strength between pairs to be learned was created by re-pairing stimuli and responses from high associative strength lists. Both the high associative strength condition and the re-paired condition produced superior recall of response items. Results suggested that the development of response availability in paired-associate learning depends in part not only upon the strength of the initial relationship between each stimulus and response pair to be learned, but also upon the context provided by other stimuli in the list. The meaning of "present at input" in studies evaluating the principle of encoding specificity (Tulving & Thompson, 1973) was questioned. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Storage and retrieval of associative clusters: A stages-of-learning analysis of associative memory traces.

In this research, the assumptions underlying the unitary trace theory of item representation and acquisition were tested in two cued-recall experiments in which the degree of preexperimental knowledge (typicality) was manipulated. Subjects learned lists of word triads (each of which consisted of a single cue and two targets) to a stringent acquisition criterion. In Experiment 1, typicality was manipulated in the absence of semantic relationships between members of the associative clusters. In Experiment 2, semantic relationships were present among cluster members, and preexperimental knowledge was manipulated by varying the degree of intracluster category membership as measured by whether cue and target items were typical or atypical category exemplars. In both experiments a mathematical model that embodies stages-of-learning distinctions was used to analyze the acquisition data. The results indicated that (1) cues and targets were represented in a single holistic memory trace, and (2) the manipulation of the degree of preexperimental knowledge affected both trace storage and retrieval learning, but had only a minimal impact on retrieval performance between the time a trace was stored and the time retrieval learning was complete. It was argued that these findings are consistent with a single unitary trace interpretation, namely, the modified storage-retrieval model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Separating bias and sensitivity in judgments of associative memory.

Ratings of the degree of association between words are linearly related to normed associative strengths, but the intercept is high, and the slope is shallow (the judgments of associative memory [JAM] function). Two experiments included manipulations intended to decrease the intercept and increase the slope. Discrimination training on many pairs of words and constraining ratings to sum to a constant both reduced the intercept but failed to change the slope. The intercept of the JAM function appears to contain a bias component that can be manipulated independently of the slope, which reflects sensitivity to associative strengths. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Rehearsal strategies can enlarge or diminish the spacing effect: Pure versus mixed lists and encoding strategy.

Using 5 experiments, the authors explored the dependency of spacing effects on rehearsal patterns. Encouraging rehearsal borrowing produced opposing effects on mixed lists (containing both spaced and massed repetitions) and pure lists (containing only one or the other), magnifying spacing effects on mixed lists but diminishing spacing effects on pure lists. Rehearsing with borrowing produced large spacing effects on mixed lists but not on pure lists for both free recall (Experiment 1) and recognition (Experiment 2). In contrast, rehearsing only the currently visible item produced spacing effects on both mixed lists and pure lists in free recall (Experiment 3) and recognition (Experiment 4). Experiment 5 demonstrated these effects using a fully within-subjects design. Rehearse-aloud protocols showed that rehearsal borrowing redistributed study from massed to spaced items on mixed lists, especially during massed presentations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Proactive interference, accessibility bias, and process dissociations: Valid subject reports of memory.

Proactive interference was assessed with a variant of the process-dissociation procedure, which separates effects of habit (accessibility bias) and recollection (discriminability). In three cued-recall experiments, proactive interference was shown to be an effect of bias rather than an effect on actual remembering. Divided attention, age, and study duration selectively influenced the recollection parameter, whereas training probability selectively influenced the habit parameter. Furthermore, in Experiments 2 and 3, subjective reports of remembering were highly correlated with, and nearly identical to, objective estimates of recollection gained from the process-dissociation procedure. The authors discuss the relevance of the results to theories of proactive interference and argue that older adults' greater susceptibility to interference effects is sometimes caused by an inability to recollect rather than by an inability to inhibit a preponderant response. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Item and associative memory in amnestic mild cognitive impairment: Performance on standardized memory tests.

The earliest neuroanatomical changes in amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) involve the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex, structures implicated in the integration and learning of associative information. The authors hypothesized that individuals with aMCI would have impairments in associative memory above and beyond the known impairments in item memory. A group of 29 individuals with aMCI and 30 matched control participants were administered standardized tests of object-location recall and symbol-symbol recall, from which both item and associative recall scores were derived. As expected, item recall was impaired in the aMCI group relative to controls. Associative recall in the aMCI group was even more impaired than was item recall. The best group discriminators were measures of associative recall, with which the sensitivity and specificity for detecting aMCI were 76% and 90% for symbol-symbol recall and were 86% and 97% for object-location recall. Associative recall may be particularly sensitive to early cognitive change in aMCI, because this ability relies heavily on the medial temporal lobe structures that are affected earliest in aMCI. Incorporating measures of associative recall into clinical evaluations of individuals with memory change may be useful for detecting aMCI. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Differential effects of age on item and associative measures of memory: A meta-analysis.

In this meta-analysis, the authors evaluated recent suggestions that older adults' episodic memory impairments are partially due to a reduced ability to encode and retrieve associated/bound units of information. Results of 90 studies of episodic memory for both item and associative information in 3,197 young and 3,192 older adults provided support for the age-related associative/binding deficit suggestion, indicating a larger effect of age on memory for associative information than for item information. Moderators assessed included the type of associations, encoding instructions, materials, and test format. Results indicated an age-related associative deficit in memory for source, context, temporal order, spatial location, and item pairings, in both verbal and nonverbal material. An age-related associative deficit was quite pronounced under intentional learning instructions but was not clearly evident under incidental learning instructions. Finally, test format was also found to moderate the associative deficit, with older adults showing an associative/binding deficit when item memory was evaluated via recognition tests but not when item memory was evaluated via recall tests, in which case the age-related deficits were similar for item and associative information. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Synesthesia and memory: Color congruency, von Restorff, and false memory effects.

In the current study, we explored the influence of synesthesia on memory for word lists. We tested 10 grapheme-color synesthetes who reported an experience of color when reading letters or words. We replicated a previous finding that memory is compromised when synesthetic color is incongruent with perceptual color. Beyond this, we found that, although their memory for word lists was superior overall, synesthetes did not exhibit typical color- or semantic-defined von Restorff isolation effects (von Restorff, 1933) compared with control participants. Moreover, our synesthetes exhibited a reduced Deese–Roediger–McDermott false memory effect (Deese, 1959; Roediger & McDermott, 1995). Taken as a whole, these findings are consistent with the idea that color-grapheme synesthesia can lead people to place a greater emphasis on item-specific processing and surface form characteristics of words in a list (e.g., the letters that make them up) relative to relational processing and more meaning-based processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Enhanced release from proactive interference in nonamnesic alcoholic individuals: Implications for impaired associative binding.

Proactive interference (PI) occurs when previously learned information reduces the ability to acquire new, related information. Given that PI is modulated by the cholinergic system in rats (E. De Rosa & M. E. Hasselmo, 2000) and that chronic alcohol dependence disrupts cholinergic function in rats and humans, associative properties of PI in patients with alcoholism were examined. It was hypothesized that normal PI contingencies would be disrupted in alcoholic participants. When tested with a paired-associate simultaneous discrimination paradigm, analogous to that used in the rat model, alcoholic participants showed significantly less PI than controls yet performed comparably on a control response reversal task. The absence of PI in alcoholic participants may reflect impaired configural binding of paired-associate stimuli while sparing the elemental ability to process each stimulus component. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)