The relatedness effect on judgments of learning: A closer look at the contribution of processing fluency

Abstract

The cue-utilization view to judgments of learning (JOLs) assumes that both ease of processing during study and people's beliefs about memory may contribute to people's predictions on the likelihood of remembering recently studied information. However, a recent study (Mueller, Tauber, & Dunlosky, Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 20(2), 378-384, 2013; Experiment 3) found that processing fluency does not contribute to the effect of pair relatedness on JOLs, that is, to higher JOLs for related paired associates as compared to unrelated paired associates. We investigated whether this finding primarily depends on specific aspects of the paired associates employed or on the measure of processing fluency used in the previous study. In our first two experiments, participants therefore studied lists with (a) uniformly high associative strengths versus (b) a wide range of associative strengths. Results showed that processing disfluency-operationalized as number of trials to acquisition in Experiment 1 and as selfpaced study time in Experiment 2-partially mediated the effect of relatedness on JOLs for both types of lists. Finally, in Experiment 3, the contribution of processing fluency to the relatedness effect increased with study-test experience. Unlike Mueller et al., we thus found that processing fluency contributes to the relatedness effect on JOLs. These findings are consistent with the assumption that ease of processing is an important basis for JOLs.

The effect of animacy on metamemory

“…This may have occurred because the animacy effect on JOLs is mediated by differential processing fluency. In Experiment 2a, we investigated the possibility that processing fluency, as measured by study time (e.g., Castel et al, 2007;Koriat, 2008;Koriat & Ma'ayan, 2005;Koriat, Ma'ayan, & Nussinson, 2006;Miele, Finn, & Molden, 2011;Mueller et al, 2014;Undorf & Erdfelder, 2015), mediates the relationship between animacy and JOLs. Study time is inversely related to JOLs (e.g., Castel et al, 2007;Koriat, 2008;Undorf & Erdfelder, 2011), and hence is arguably a candidate for mediating the animacy effect on JOLs.…”

The limited use of the fluency heuristic: Converging evidence across different procedures

“…This diversity of measures led Reber et al (2004, p. 50) to claim that "there seemingly is no single objective fluency." It even appears that different measures of fluency may lead to different results (Undorf & Erdfelder, 2015), because "no specific measure captures all aspects of processing fluency" (p. 655). Poldrack and Logan (1997) had already found that speed measures explained only a portion of subjective fluency in recognition.…”

“…One would have to assume that participants are aware that subjectively experienced increases in retrieval fluency during an experimental session are merely due to repeated presentations of that object, and are thus not diagnostic of one's true familiarity with that object (cf. Dechêne et al, 2009Dechêne et al, , 2010Hansen & Wänke, 2013;Undorf & Erdfelder, 2015). Studying the effect of experimentally manipulated fluency on FH use, Hertwig et al (2008, Exp.…”

“…In addition to the metamnemonic and attributional processes discussed above (see also Susser et al, 2016), the process of recognition may be composed of several subprocesses, some or all of which contribute more or less to subjectively experienced fluency (Reber et al, 2004). Thus, there are several options for how to operationalize objective fluency: For example, Benjamin, Bjork, and Schwartz (1998) used answer retrieval latencies; Reber et al (2004), identification latencies; Schooler and Hertwig (2005), recognition latencies; Mueller, Dunlosky, Tauber, and Rhodes (2014), lexical decision latencies; Susser et al (2016), naming latencies; and Undorf and Erdfelder (2015), the numbers of trials to acquisition and self-paced study times (see also Koriat, 2008). This diversity of measures led Reber et al (2004, p. 50) to claim that "there seemingly is no single objective fluency."…”

“…For example, participants may well differentiate whether experienced fluency stems from the retrieved object itself, or rather from some external source, the so-called context (previous encounters, perceptual conditions, etc. ; see Dechêne, Stahl, Hansen, & Wänke, 2009Hansen & Wänke, 2013;Undorf & Erdfelder, 2015). Several studies have shown that such subjective evaluations of the experienced retrieval fluency could have substantial impact (see von Helversen, Gendolla, Winkielman, & Schmidt, 2008;Wänke & Hansen, 2015).…”