Episodic and semantic content of memory and imagination: A multilevel analysis

Abstract

Autobiographical memories of past events and imaginations of future scenarios comprise both episodic and semantic content. Correlating the amount of “internal” (episodic) and “external” (semantic) details generated when describing autobiographical events can illuminate the relationship between the processes supporting these constructs. Yet previous studies performing such correlations were limited by aggregating data across all events generated by an individual, potentially obscuring the underlying relationship within the events themselves. In the current paper we reanalyzed datasets from eight published studies using a multilevel approach, allowing us to explore the relationship between internal and external details within events. We also examined whether this relationship changes with healthy aging. Our reanalyses demonstrated a largely negative relationship between the internal and external details produced when describing autobiographical memories and future imaginations. This negative relationship was stronger and more consistent for older adults, and was evident both in direct and indirect measures of semantic content. Moreover, this relationship appears to be specific to episodic tasks, as no relationship was observed for a non-episodic picture description task. This negative association suggests that people do not generate semantic information indiscriminately, but do so in a compensatory manner, to embellish episodically impoverished events. Our reanalysis further lends support for dissociable processes underpinning episodic and semantic information generation when remembering and imagining autobiographical events.

Age effects in autobiographical memory depend on the measure

“…The instructions for each task in the present study emphasised the recall of specific event details, therefore the production of semantic information might be considered tangential, and at present, there is little consensus regarding why these details are more common in older adults' memories. A recent multilevel analysis of autobiographical memories from eight previous studies suggested that, at the level of the individual memory, recall of external memory details (including semantic details) was negatively correlated with recall of internal (episodic) details (Devitt, Addis, & Schacter, 2017). In this study, however, older adults' semantic recall did not appear to compensate for a failure to retrieve episodic details.…”

External details revisited – A new taxonomy for coding ‘non‐episodic’ content during autobiographical memory retrieval

“…Despite a preponderance of ABM studies focusing on the provision of internal details, we believe the tide is slowly turning. While this study is not the first to suggest a reorienting of attention to external details during ABM retrieval (e.g., Devitt, Addis, & Schacter, ), ours is the first to provide a comprehensive and user‐friendly taxonomy to parse external details into intuitive subcategories. The importance of a renewed focus on AI external details is underscored by recent evidence suggesting a compensatory shift in external detail production as internal details begin to decline in healthy ageing (Devitt et al ., ).…”

“…While this study is not the first to suggest a reorienting of attention to external details during ABM retrieval (e.g., Devitt, Addis, & Schacter, ), ours is the first to provide a comprehensive and user‐friendly taxonomy to parse external details into intuitive subcategories. The importance of a renewed focus on AI external details is underscored by recent evidence suggesting a compensatory shift in external detail production as internal details begin to decline in healthy ageing (Devitt et al ., ). From a clinical perspective, our NExt classification system further has the potential to inform our understanding of the neurocognitive mechanisms driving ABM dysfunction in various disorders.…”

Semi-automated transcription and scoring of autobiographical memory narratives

“…details from events. Yet, they produce an augmented number of external (non event specific) details-a pattern attributed to compensatory processes to "fill in" for impoverished episodic detail (Levine, Svoboda, Hay, Winocur, & Moscovitch, 2002; also see Gaesser, Sacchetti, Addis, and Schacter, 2011;Devitt, Addis, and Schacter, 2017;Addis, Musicaro, Pan, and Schacter, 2010). A similar pattern has been observed in PTSD (Brown et al, 2014).…”