We explored 2 research questions: whether criterion shifts within different recognition tasks are reliable across testing sessions and whether such shifts correlate across the different tasks. In Experiment 1, we established consistent group-level criterion shifting based on expected strength of target items in the test. False-alarm rates were higher when expected strength was weak as opposed to strong, even when expected strength cues were unblocked at test. Test-retest reliabilities in this strength-cuing environment were good. In Experiment 2, we manipulated either the probability (high or low) or expected memory strength (strong or weak) of target items and had people perform both tasks on each of 2 days of testing. Varying the probability of target items consistently produced criterion shifts, as did manipulating target memory strength. Regarding individual differences, shifting in a given test context predicted shifting on a second day in that same test context. However, one's tendency to shift a decision criterion on 1 type of test context did not predict one's tendency to do so in the other. The extent to which people shifted their decision criterion in recognition memory testing was largely dependent on the type of test.

We explored the nature of focal versus nonfocal event-based prospective memory retrieval. In the context of a lexical decision task, people received an intention to respond to a single word (focal) in one condition and to a category label (nonfocal) for the other condition. Participants experienced both conditions, and their order was manipulated. The focal instruction condition was a single word presented multiple times. In Experiment 1, the stimuli in the nonfocal condition were different exemplars from a category, each presented once. In the nonfocal condition retrieval was poorer and reaction times were slower during the ongoing task as compared to the focal condition, replicating prior findings. In Experiment 2, the stimulus in the nonfocal condition was a single category exemplar repeated multiple times. When this single-exemplar nonfocal condition followed in time the single-item focal condition, focal versus nonfocal performance was virtually indistinguishable. These results demonstrate that people can modify their stimulus processing and expectations in event-based prospective memory tasks based on experience with the nature of prospective cues and with the ongoing task.

No abstract

We investigated illusory recollection by dividing lists of associated words into three subsets (high, medium and low) based on their backward associative strength (BAS) to an unstudied theme. Participants studied these subsets at different visual locations on a computer screen and afterwards were given a source memory test. In Experiment 1, we varied the order in which high- and medium-BAS subsets were studied. In Experiment 2, we again manipulated study order as well as the associative strength of the medium-BAS subsets (strong or weak). Across both experiments, illusory recollection was constrained by both study order and BAS. Source attributions to the high-BAS location were more likely (a source-strength effect) when high-BAS items were studied first or studied following items of relatively low associative strength. However, attributions to the strong medium-BAS studied location were more likely when these items were studied before high-BAS items. These findings are interpreted as resulting from misbinding of source details at encoding which can be explained by the activation-monitoring theory of illusory recollection.