Theories of false memories, particularly in the Deese–Roediger–McDermott (DRM) paradigm, focus on word association strength and gist. Backward associative strength (BAS) is a strong predictor of false recall in this paradigm. However, other than being defined as a measure of association between studied list words and falsely recalled nonpresented critical words, there is little understanding of this variable. In Experiment 1, we used a knowledge-type taxonomy to classify the semantic relations in DRM stimuli. These knowledge types predicted false-recall probability, as well as BAS itself, with the most important being situation features, synonyms, and taxonomic relations. In three subsequent experiments, we demonstrated that lists composed solely of situation features can elicit a gist and produce false memories, particularly when monitoring processes are made more difficult. Our results identify the semantic factors that underlie BAS and suggest how considering semantic relations leads to a better understanding of gist formation.

This study identifies individuals who are habitually susceptible to accepting postevent misinformation across testing on three separate events. The results indicate that those individuals identified as habitually susceptible exhibited higher dissociation scores and less of an association between memory accuracy and confidence than did the individuals identified as nonhabitually susceptible. When they were asked to identify the source of the remembered information, similar patterns of source attributions were found for all individuals when they were responding correctly and incorrectly to nonmisinformation and when they were correctly rejecting items of misinformation. Importantly, from a source-monitoring perspective, individuals identified as habitually susceptible demonstrated a different pattern of source attributions than did those classified as nonhabitually susceptible when they were accepting misinformation. Habitually susceptible individuals were as likely to attribute the source of their memory incorrectly to something seen in the experienced event as to attribute it correctly to something read after the fact.

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Sarcastic speech is ubiquitous in most languages, though understanding sarcasm is highly dependent upon cultural and social contextual factors (Campbell & Katz, Discourse Processes, 2012, 49, 459). It is therefore surprising that little research has examined the ability of nonnative speakers to understand the sarcastic cues of a second language. In the current study, native English speakers and English as a second language (ESL) speakers were tested in each of four different conditions. Three of the conditions presented isolated cues involved in the detection of sarcasm (prosody, written context, and facial expression) and asked participants to identify the emotional intent of the cue (sarcasm or sincerity). The fourth condition combined spoken context, prosody, and facial expressions into each trial and asked the participant to identify sarcasm or sincerity. Participants also indicated their experience with sarcasm through the completion of three questionnaires:

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