Sensitivity of Reality Monitoring to Fluency: Evidence from Behavioral Performance and Event-Related Potential (ERP) Old/New Effects

Abstract

Background: Item memory and source memory are differently processed with both behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) evidence. Reality monitoring, a specific type of source memory, which refers to the ability to differentiate external sources from internal sources, has been drawing much attention. Among factors that have an impact on reality monitoring, fluency has not been well-studied. Therefore, the current study aimed to investigate whether fluency could affect reality monitoring, through observations on both behavioral performance and electrophysiological patterns. Material/Methods: Adopting ERP techniques, participants were required either to watch the presentation of a name/picture pair, or to imagine a picture for each displayed name, once (low fluency) or twice (high fluency). Later they completed a reality monitoring task of identifying names as perceived, imagined, or novel items. Behavioral performance was measured, and ERP waveforms were recorded. Results: Behaviorally, high fluency items were faster and more accurately attributed to the sources than low fluency items. ERP waveforms revealed that late positive component (LPC) occurred for all 4 types of items, while imagined items of low fluency did not record a robust FN400 or late frontal old/new effect. Conclusions: As results revealed, the factor of fluency does influence reality monitoring in terms of accuracy and responding speed. Meanwhile, for imagined items of low fluency, the absence of FN400 and frontal old/new effect also suggests the sensitivity of reality monitoring to fluency, because these representatives of familiarity-based processing and post-retrieval monitoring are inevitably involved in the process of differentiating internal source from external source.

Does Expecting Matter? The Impact of Experimentally Established Expectations on Subsequent Memory Retrieval of Emotional Words

“…The results depicted that there were processing differences in the mechanisms, rather than just differences in memory strength, between item and source memory, specifically a subtype of source memory. These findings provide additional evidence for dual-process models of memory (Cooper et al 2017;Leynes et al 2017;Nie et al 2019b;Ye et al 2019), rather than models that claim a single process during the test (Hayes et al 2017;Slotnick and Dodson 2005).…”

“…Two subtypes of episodic memory, namely item memory and source memory, have been identified as dissociable. Item memory allows us to distinguish previously experienced items from novel items, while source memory enables us to retrieve the peripheral details and the contexts from which an event was originally acquired (Ehrenberg and Klauer 2005;Li and Nie 2021;Nie et al 2019a;Nie et al 2019b;Ye et al 2019).…”

“…According to dual-process models, episodic memory relies on two independent processes: familiarity and recollection. Familiarity is more automatic and reflects only a sense of knowing, whereas recollection is more consciousness-consuming and requires effort to recall the details (Cooper et al 2017;Leynes et al 2017;Nie et al 2019b;Ye et al 2019). Item memory, particularly when tested through recognition tasks, requires both processes, but familiarity plays a more significant role because a feeling of knowing is often sufficient to identify items.…”

Neural correlates of the Dunning–Kruger effect

“…Accordingly, analysis of RTs during encoding revealed that over‐estimators responded faster than under‐estimators did during encoding, which is consistent with a large body of prior findings on fluency (Alter & Oppenheimer, 2009; Bader & Mecklinger, 2017; Bruett & Leynes, 2015; Castel, McCabe, & Roediger, 2007; Cermak, Verfaellie, Sweeney, & Jacoby, 1992; Doss, Bluestone, & Gallo, 2016; Hertzog, Dunlosky, Robinson, & Kidder, 2003; Kurilla & Westerman, 2008; Leynes & Addante, 2016; Leynes & Zish, 2012; Li, Gao, Wang, & Guo, 2015; Nie, Xiao, Liu, Zhu, & Zhang, 2019; Serra & Dunlosky, 2005; Thapar & Westerman, 2009; Volz, Schooler, & von Cramon, 2010; Westerman, 2008; Whittlesea & Leboe, 2000, 2003). Thus, subjects could have responded more quickly to items by virtue of the items seeming more fluent.…”

ERP Characteristics of Inducing Rule Validity in Number Series Under Time Pressure

“…Electrophysiological analyses followed our previous studies and examples of others' works (Nie et al, 2014(Nie et al, , 2016(Nie et al, , 2019Nie & Yu, 2021;Picton et al, 2000;Ye et al, 2019;Zhou et al, 2020). We followed our own prior research as well as others because we averaged the waveforms as others had, but our previous studies had focused upon memory rather than the current that focused on inductive reasoning task.…”