Memorial consequences of variation in behavior perception

Lassiter, G. Daniel; Stone, Julie I.; Rogers, Scott L.

doi:10.1016/0022-1031(88)90037-6

Cited by 65 publications

(59 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The researchers found that recall was better for events when there were no deletions and when the deletions were of segments within an event, preserving the event boundaries. Segmentation grain has also shown an impact on memory: recall for details is better after fine-grained segmentation than after coarse-grained segmentation [49][50][51].…”

Section: Long-term Memory For Eventsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Segmentation in the perception and memory of events

Kurby

Zacks

2008

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

561

523

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People make sense of continuous streams of observed behavior in part by segmenting them into events. Event segmentation seems to be an ongoing component of everyday perception. Events are segmented simultaneously at multiple timescales, and are grouped hierarchically. Activity in brain regions including the posterior temporal and parietal cortex and lateral frontal cortex increases transiently at event boundaries. The parsing of ongoing activity into events is related to the updating of working memory, to the contents of long-term memory, and to the learning of new procedures. Event segmentation might arise as a side effect of an adaptive mechanism that integrates information over the recent past to improve predictions about the near future. Making sense by segmentingImagine walking with a friend to a coffee shop. If asked to describe this activity in more detail you might list a few of the events that make it up. The events listed could be broken up by changes in the physical features of the activity, such as location: 'We started out by going down to the laboratory. We grabbed our coats and put them on. Then we walked out of the building to the corner by the subway station…' Or, they could be broken up by changes in conceptual features, such as your goals: 'We started our walk talking about how much construction is going on. When the topic turned to the new building with the coffee shop we decided to head over there to give it a try…' Such descriptions are typical of how people talk about events, and they illustrate something important about perception: people make sense of a complex dynamic world in part by segmenting it into a modest number of meaningful units. Recent research on event perception reveals that, as an ongoing part of normal perception, people segment activity into events and subevents. This segmentation is related to core functions of cognitive control and memory encoding, and is subserved by isolable neural mechanisms. Events and their boundariesBy 'event' we mean a segment of time at a given location that is conceived by an observer to have a beginning and an end [1]. In particular we focus on the events that make up everyday life on the timescale of a few seconds to tens of minutes -things like opening an envelope, pouring coffee into a cup, changing the diaper of a baby or calling a friend on the phone. Event Segmentation Theory (EST) [2] (see Glossary) proposes that perceptual systems spontaneously segment activity into events as a side effect of trying to anticipate upcoming information (see Box 1). When perceptual or conceptual features of the activity change, prediction becomes more difficult and errors in prediction increase transiently. At such points, people update memory representations of 'what is happening now'. The processing cascade of detecting a

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Section: Long-term Memory For Eventsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Segmentation in the perception and memory of events

Kurby

Zacks

2008

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

561

523

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…During a unitization procedure, participants typically view a film that contains a sequence of actions, and they are requested to push a button each time a meaningful unit of behavior occurs (e.g., see Newtson, 1973). The unitization task, which has been used in a variety of unitizing studies (e.g., Lassiter & Stone, 1984;Lassiter, Stone, & Rogers, 1988;Newtson, 1973), included the following instructions:…”

Section: Study 1: Spatial Distance and Unitization Judgmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transcending the "Here": The Effect of Spatial Distance on Social Judgment.

Henderson

Fujita

Trope

et al. 2006

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

231

170

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Construal level theory proposes that increasing the reported spatial distance of events produces judgments that reflect abstract, schematic representations of the events. Across 4 experiments, the authors examined the impact of spatial distance on construal-dependent social judgments. Participants structured behavior into fewer, broader units (Study 1) and increasingly attributed behavior to enduring dispositions rather than situational constraints (Study 2) when the behavior was spatially distant rather than near. Participants reported that typical events were more likely and atypical events less likely when events were more spatially distant (Study 3). They were also less likely to extrapolate from specific cases that deviated from general trends when making predictions about more spatially distant events (Study 4). Implications for social judgment are discussed.

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“…A discussion of some potential benefits and drawbacks to metal processes becoming automated or nonconscious can be found in the section entitled, "Automatic Shifts in Behavior Unitization: Consequences for the Social Perceiver." that a fine level of unitization confers on perceivers a higher information state with regard to an observed other is provided by studies that show that increases in unitization rate are associated with enhanced memory for the specific actions of another (Geers and Lassiter 1999;Hanson and Hirst 1989;Lassiter 1988;Lassiter and Slaw 1991;Lassiter et al 1988). That is, all things being equal, the more actions perceivers discriminate in a behavior sequence, the more actions they are likely to encode into memory and, in turn, the more actions they are likely to be able to retrieve from memory.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…For example, Cohen and Ebbesen (1979) and later Lassiter et al (2000) found that individuals whose observational goal was to learn an 2 Not all kinds of information become more memorable as unitization rate increases. Based on Newtson's (1976b) view of behavior perception as a feature-monitoring process, Lassiter et al (1988) predicted and found a negative relationship between unitization rate and memory for the nonaction-related details of a behavior sequence. That is, in maximizing action-related information gain, perceivers appear to shift more of their limited monitoring capacity to those features most critical to defining actions, thereby resulting in the acquisition and subsequent retention of less nonaction-related information.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

On the Induction and Consequences of Variation in Behavior Perception

Ratcliff

Lassiter

2007

Curr Psychol

Self Cite

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Research indicates that perceivers regulate information gain from their observation of ongoing behavior by varying the number and kind of actions they identify as meaningful. Although numerous factors have been shown to induce variation in this behavior-perception process, it is not currently known whether observers must consciously and intentionally initiate these changes. To address this question, different observational goals (impression formation or memorization) were nonconsciously primed in participants who then viewed and segmented a behavior sequence into meaningful actions. Although participants were unaware of its effects, the priming manipulation led to quantitative and qualitative shifts in their perception of the behavior that were similar to those found in a previous study in which observational goals were manipulated via explicit instructions. Importantly, these shifts in perception, in turn, influenced evaluations of the observed actor and memory for her behavior. We conclude that an act of will is not required for adjustments in behavior perception to be initiated, and, furthermore, that a full understanding of social judgment cannot be achieved without examination of the behavior-perception process.

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Memorial consequences of variation in behavior perception

Cited by 65 publications

References 32 publications

Segmentation in the perception and memory of events

Segmentation in the perception and memory of events

Transcending the "Here": The Effect of Spatial Distance on Social Judgment.

On the Induction and Consequences of Variation in Behavior Perception

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