Certain Temporal Characteristics of the Recall of Verbal Associates

Bousfield, W. A.; Sedgewick, C. H. W.; Cohen, Burton H.

doi:10.2307/1418075

Cited by 86 publications

(105 citation statements)

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“…Likewise, mean recall latency can be calculated directly by simply averaging recall latencies across trials and subjects. Alternatively, mean recall latency can also be measured by a parameter estimate given by a curve-fitting technique described in the Results section, and previous researchers have uniformly relied on these parameter estimates when measuring recall latency (e.g., Bousfield, Sedgewick, & Cohen, 1954;Gronlund & Shiffrin, 1986;Roediger, Stellon, & Tulving, 1977;Rohrer, 1996;. The present study includes values of mean recall latency obtained by both direct calculation and curve fitting, and both techniques yielded the same conclusion.…”

Section: Present Researchmentioning

confidence: 65%

Concurrent task effects on memory retrieval

Rohrer

Pashler

2003

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

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Previous studies combining continuous free recall with a concurrent task have generally shown that concurrent tasks impose fairly negligible effects on memory retrieval. By contrast, dual-task studies employing either cued recall or semantic retrieval reveal gross memory impairment and suggest that retrieval is delayed by the centrally demanding phase of the concurrent tasks (i.e., response selection). To explore this conflict, subjects performed continuous free recall while carrying out a serial-choiceresponse time (RT) task, as in the previous free recall studies. Unlike these previous studies, however, the choice-RT task utilized arbitrary stimulus-response mappings in order to increase the proportion of time devoted to the centrally demanding response selection phase. Recall total was reduced significantly, and recall latency was slowed substantially.

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Section: Present Researchmentioning

confidence: 65%

Concurrent task effects on memory retrieval

Rohrer

Pashler

2003

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

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“…Bousfield et al (1954) presented study lists to subjects one, two, three, four, or five times and then plotted cumulative recall across five 2-min intervals. We visually estimated these data points, and, by incorporating the curve fits presented by Bousfield et aI., we were able to derive estimates ofmean latency for each condition.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

An analysis of latency and interresponse time in free recall

1994

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In four experiments, subjects freely recalled previously studied items while a voice key and computer recorded each item's recall latency relative to the onset of the recall period. The measures of recall probability and mean recall latency were shown to be empirically independent, demonstrating that there exists no a priori relationship between the two. In all four experiments, latency distributions were fit well by the ex-Gaussian, suggesting that retrieval includes a brief normally distributed initiation stage followed by a longer exponentially distributed search stage. Further, the variation in mean latency stemmed from the variation in the duration of the search stage, not the initiation stage. Interresponse times (IRTs), the time elapsed between two successive item recalls, were analyzed as well. The growth of mean IRTs, plotted as a function of output position, was shown to be a simple function of the number of items not yet recalled. Finally, the mathematical nature of both free recall latency and IRT growth are shown to be consistent with a simple theoretical account of retrieval that depicts mean recall latency as a measure of the breadth of search. 511Perhaps the most striking feature of episodic free recall is the distinctively long pause that sometimes precedes a response. Even a study list with only a few items often results in response latencies greater than 10 sec. These lengthy response times are unique to free recall, as cued recall and recognition typically yield response times of 1 or 2 sec. Yet although analyses of cued recall latency (e.g., MacLeod & Nelson, 1984) or recognition latency (e.g., Hockley, 1982) are quite common, few investigators have measured free recall latency, the time elapsed from the onset of the recall period to the recall of an item, or interresponse times (IRTs), the time between consecutive retrievals.The limited attention given to either temporal measure may stem from the belief that recall probability and recall latency are a priori inversely related and therefore redundant measures. That is, an experimental manipulation that weakens the memory trace and thereby reduces recall probability should necessarily increase recall latency as well. Ifthis were the case, researchers could simply ignore free recall latency without overlooking any important information. Although such negative correlations can occur, there is no prior evidence that they either must (or even usually) occur. Indeed, three experiments in the present investigation yielded correlations between recall probability and latency that were negative, nonexistent, This research was supported in part by NIMH Training Grant MH-14268 to the first author. We thank Mari Chernow for her assistance in the laboratory and Bennet Murdock, Jeroen Raaijmakers, Richard Shiffrin, and Geoffrey Loftus for their comments. Correspondence concerning this article, as well as requests for raw data, should be addressed to D. Rohrer, Department of Psychology 0 I09, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093. and po...

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“…A very specific instance of the relative-strength model is the so-called random-search model (Bousfield, Sedgewick, & Cohen, 1954;McGill, 1963). This version of the relative-strength model assumes that all items have the same strength, whereas the relative-strength rule, ofcourse, allows for variable strengths.…”

Section: Relative Strength and Recau Latencymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Because a cumulative recall curve is actually a cumulative latency distribution, the analyses of cumulative recall and (noncumulative) latency distributions are somewhat redundant. Nevertheless, cumulative recall curves are presented here so that the present experiment can be easily compared with experiments by other researchers who uniformly prefer the cumulative form (e.g., Bousfield et al, 1954;Gronlund & Shiffrin, 1986;Payne, 1986;Roediger, Stellon, & Tulving, 1977;Roediger & Thorpe, 1978). Cumulative recall has not, however, been analyzed after first partitioning trials by recall total.…”

Section: N(i-e-(t-c)/)mentioning

confidence: 99%

On the relative and absolute strength of a memory trace

Rohrer

1996

Mem Cogn

106

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Subjects studied either an 8-or If-word list and later recalled the items while a voice key recorded each response latency. The trials were partitioned by recall total in order to examine the means and distributions of both latencies and interresponse times as a function of recall total. Each analysis was consistent with the view that an item's absolute strength determines whether it is recalled whereas an item's relative strength determines when it is recalled. In addition, mean latency was effectively proportional to study list length yet independent of recall total. All of the analyses were consistent with the view that the set of study items is sampled according to a relative-strength rule until all items are found and that a sampled item is recovered into consciousness only when its absolute strength exceeds a fixed threshold.

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Certain Temporal Characteristics of the Recall of Verbal Associates

Cited by 86 publications

References 0 publications

Concurrent task effects on memory retrieval

Concurrent task effects on memory retrieval

An analysis of latency and interresponse time in free recall

On the relative and absolute strength of a memory trace

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