Prospective memory, remembering to carry out one's planned activities, was investigated using a naturalistic paradigm. Three experiments, with a total of 405 participants, were conducted. The goal was to demonstrate that the cognitive processing underlying successful everyday prospective remembering involves components other than mere "memory." Those components are probably best represented as individual differences in various cognitive capacities. More specifically, metamemory, attentional capacities, and planning processes that reprioritize intentions according to the demands of everyday life may determine how people actually accomplish the plans they establish for themselves. The results of these experiments suggest that researchers interested in the topic will have to contend with a multidimensional set of factors before any comprehensive understanding of prospective remembering can be realized.

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Participants engaged in a creative idea-generation task that required them to monitor source to devise ideas not offered previously by others. In Experiment 1, inadvertent plagiarism (cryptomnesia) occurred more often when participants were generating ideas than when they were taking a recognition test. In Experiment 2, focusing participants on the origin of their ideas during generation resembled the focusing that occurs in recognition performance and reduced plagiarism. In Experiment 3, a speeded-response condition increased inadvertent plagiarism by mimicking conditions in which people cannot or do not adequately monitor source. In Experiment 4, plagiarism was reduced both when participants offered their new ideas in a one-on-one context as compared with a more anonymous group setting and when participants were specifically instructed to avoid plagiarism. The results are discussed in terms of source-monitoring decision criteria and the conscious and unconscious processes that support that monitoring.

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Evidence has suggested that some forms of plagiarism might result from students' inadequate knowledge of proper citation techniques (Roig, 1997). We taught students about plagiarism identification and proper paraphrasing skills. Undergraduates who received no treatment, feedback, plagiarism examples, or a combination of feedback and examples completed 2 versions of a plagiarism knowledge survey, paraphrased a literary passage, and rated their knowledge of plagiarism. Participants in all conditions except the control condition were better able to identify plagiarism. In the paraphrasing exercise, the example conditions showed a reduction in plagiarism. Thus, we identify an exercise that can help students identify and avoid plagiarism.