Terms and Definitions:

Memory Probes

Targets (actual words that were presented on the original list of materials)

Distractors

meaning consistent (they maintain the meaning expressed by the original word)

meaning inconsistent (they do not maintain the meaning expressed by the original word)

False Alarms (yes to something other than a target)

Incorrect Rejection (saying no to the target)

False-recognition (in which false reports arise spontaneously)

Misinformation: information that falsifies incidental details of target events is presented between the presentation of the original material and the presentation of the memory test.

Parallel storage processes

Verbatim memories (Process that generates episodic memories of targets’ surface forms )

Gist memories (Process that stores retrieval cues to locate relevant concepts)

1. the types of retrieval cues provided by retrieval probes that are supplied by the recognition probes
2. Verbatim memories fade more rapidly than Gist memories.

Type of Probes (Probes: example)
 

Originally presented: Guinness (please use this for the examples provided by the types of distractors )   Target: Guinness (the same word as originally presented)   Distractor related: Beer (maintains the gist of the original word)   Distractor unrelated: Tree (does not maintain the gist of the original word)

Instruction Sets
 

(T instructions) accept targets (words that were presented in the original material) and reject all distractors   (R instructions) accept related distractors (words that maintain the meaning of words presented in the originally) reject targets and unrelated distractors    (T+R instructions) accept both targets and related distractors and reject unrelated distractors

 

False-recognition Paradigm

• HITS (properly identifying a Target) a

 
• are based on VERBATIM TRACES
• Very strong feelings of gist memories can produce feelings of recognition/ a hit.
 
• FALSE ALARMS (yes to something other than a target)

• are based primarily on GIST TRACES

• Incorrect Rejection

• Can be based on retrieving a verbatim trace for another target and rejecting the target based on the memory of the incorrect verbatim trace
• Can also occur due to no identity judgment and no similarity judgment being made

In the misinformation paradigm there are two types of items

• Control –items that are presented and no information is present in the interval between presentation of original information and recognition test
• Misinformed items –items that are presented and misinformation is presented for them in the interval between original presentation of the items and a recognition test

• HITS (properly identifying a Target) a

• based on VERBATIM TRACES of the target item
• Very strong feelings of gist memories can produce feelings of recognition/ a hit.

• these gist memories can be for the target item or the misinformation b/c misinformation maintains the gist of the target
• FALSE ALARMS (yes to something other than a target)
• based on GIST TRACES

• these gist memories can be for both the misinformation and the target

• are based on VERBATIM TRACES

• Retrieving the verbatim trace of the misinformation
• Incorrect Rejection

• for another target and rejecting the target based on the memory of the incorrect verbatim trace
• for the misinformation

FALSE ALARMS are determined by gist memories and gist memories remain more stable over time, and so do levels of false alarms

FALSE REJECTIONS if a target probe cues the retrieval of a verbatim trace for another target, verbatim comparison will produce a rejection of a target item.

False-Recognition Research:

Experiment 1:

• Lists of words were studied by adult participants
• Half of the target words were studied twice and half were studied once
• Related distractors were synonyms (e.g. HILL if MOUNTAIN was studied, DIRT if SOIL)

• Lists of words were studied by adult participants
• Half of the target words were studied twice and half were studied once
• related distractors were antonyms of the targets

• false recognition effects were reversed for items that were studied

• Lists of words were studied by adult participants
• related distractors were the names of the categories the targets belong (e.g.

• Priming took place for half of the distractors ( half of the category name distractors were presented immediately after their related targets)

• false recognition effects were reversed for items that were primed

• Targets seem to be better retrieval cues for their verbatim memories than their gist memories and produce higher levels of identity judgments than similarity judgments
• Targets are better cues for their verbatim memories than related distractor probes and have higher levels of identification than related distractor probes have nonidentity judgments
• Semantically related distractors are better retrieval cues for target ‘s gist traces than for their verbatim traces

Used 10 previously conducted studies and ran simulations

Results:

• The goodness of fit measures came out
• Conclude that misinformation effects were due mainly to changes in verbatim comparisons
• Misinformation effects for distractors were largely due to the fact that they were often judged to be identical to retrieved verbatim memories of misinformation (sounds like source monitoring theory)
• Misinformation effect for targets were verbatim-memory effects
• Misinformation effects for distractors were partly gist-memory effects; the similarity-judgment parameter was larger for misinformation-embodying distracters
• As individuals get older they have more access to verbatim traces of target-falsifying information and constricting access to verbatim traces of target presentations]