Cross-cultural differences in the neural correlates of specific and general recognition

Abstract

Research suggests that culture influences how people perceive the world, which extends to memory specificity, or how much perceptual detail is remembered. The present study investigated cross-cultural differences (Americans vs. East Asians) at the time of encoding in the neural correlates of specific vs. general memory formation. Participants encoded photos of everyday items in the scanner and 48 hours later completed a surprise recognition test. The recognition test consisted of same (i.e., previously seen in scanner), similar (i.e., same name, different features), or new photos (i.e., items not previously seen in scanner). For Americans compared to East Asians, we predicted greater activation in the hippocampus and right fusiform for specific memory at recognition, as these regions were implicated previously in encoding perceptual details. Results revealed that East Asians activated the left fusiform and left hippocampus more than Americans for specific vs. general memory. Follow-up analyses ruled out alternative explanations of retrieval difficulty and familiarity for this pattern of cross-cultural differences at encoding. Results overall suggest that culture should be considered as another individual difference that affects memory specificity and modulates neural regions underlying these processes.

Influence of encoding instructions and response bias on cross-cultural differences in specific recognition

“…There were no differences in general memory (correctly remembering items as same or remembering a same item as similar ) across Americans and East Asians. On the other hand, Paige et al (2017) found no significant differences in specific memory between Americans and East Asians. Taken together, the results are inconsistent, as one set of instructions (Millar et al 2013) showed a cultural difference in specific memory across Americans and East Asians, but the other set of instructions (Paige et al 2017) did not.…”

“…In both Millar et al (2013) and Paige et al (2017), the authors assessed cross-cultural differences in memory specificity for everyday objects. The general structure for each study was the same.…”

“…The authors predicted that whether the judgment was made about the self, a close other, or a distant other would impact memory differently across cultures, though this prediction was not supported. In Paige et al (2017), participants were asked to determine whether they would approach an object, deciding whether they would “approach, avoid, or stay” at the same distance from the object if they encountered it in real life. This instruction was used in many prior studies of specific memory (e.g., Kensinger et al 2007a, b; Waring and Kensinger 2009, 2011) and was selected in order to have one judgment across all trials, compared to the task in Millar et al (2013).…”

“…In relation to the present study, research has suggested that “approach, avoid, or stay” decisions evoke more of a deeper processing level than other orienting instructions (Waring and Kensinger 2009), which could improve later recognition performance (Craik and Lockhart 1972; Craik and Tulving 1975; Emery and Hess 2008). Based on the lack of cultural differences in the previous study that utilized the “approach, avoid, or stay” decision (Paige et al 2017), we hypothesize that orienting to items in a more emotional or engaging way could enhance memory specificity for East Asians more than Americans, leading to equated memory performance at later test. Because the lack of cultural differences in memory measures (Paige et al 2017) occurred in an fMRI environment, a direct comparison of the two sets of instructions is needed in controlled laboratory conditions.…”

Cultural specialization of visual cortex

“…Data from a subset of these participants were analyzed in a univariate analysis published separately (Paige et al , 2017b). …”