The Role of Decision Processes in Conscious Recollection

Abstract

Dual-process models of recognition memory posit a rapid retrieval process that produces a general sense of familiarity and a slower retrieval process that produces conscious recollections of prior experience. The remember/know paradigm has been used to study the subjective correlates of these two processes, with remember judgments assumed to index conscious recollection and know judgments assumed to index familiarity. Recently, a two-criterion signal detection model has been proposed as an alternative account of this paradigm. This model assumes only a single memory process with a criterion separating remember from know responses. This report presents an empirical test of the model's critical prediction that manipulations that influence criterion placement should influence both remember and know judgments. An experiment confirmed this prediction, demonstrating that subjects who were told that 70% of the test items were study items produced more remember and know responses than subjects who were told that 30% of the test items were study items.

Recall latencies, confidence, and output positions of true and false memories: Implications for recall and metamemory theories

“…Their strengths seem to vary continuously. These findings are compatible with the concept of a single underlying dimension of memory strength (Donaldson, 1996;Hirshman & Henzler, 1998;Hirshman & Master, 1997;Xu & Bellezza, 2001) along which one or more than one criterion can be set. The higher confidence ratings subjects placed on the list words than on the recalled CNPWs can be considered a second, more conservative criterion they established along the continuum of strength within the "recalled" category.…”

Brain potentials of recollection and familiarity

“…Others have used responsesignal, speed-accuracy tradeoff (SAT) procedures to separate fast familiarity from slower recollection processes (e.g., Hintzman & Caulton, 1997;Hintzman et al, 1998;Hintzman & Curran, 1994;McElree, Dolan, & Jacoby, 1999). The utility of these approaches has been debated elsewhere: process dissociation Graf, 1995;Graf & Komatsu, 1994;Jacoby, 1998;Jacoby, Begg, & Toth, 1997;Joordens & Merikle, 1993;Toth, 1995;Toth, Reingold, & Jacoby, 1995), rememberknow (e.g., Donaldson, 1996 Gardiner, RichardsonKlavehn, & Ramponi, 1998;Hirshman, 1998;Hirshman & Henzler, 1998;Hirshman &Master, 1997), and SAT (Hintzman &Curran, 1994;Rotello & Heit, 1999).…”

Memory strength and the decision process in recognition memory

“…Historically, memory research has focused on the factors that affect retrieval accuracy, often treating other aspects of the judgment as noise or, at best, as things to be accounted for abstractly. However, the role of the decision process has become increasingly prominent in debates surrounding such issues as false and illusory memories (Hekkanen & McEvoy, 2002;Hirshman & Arndt, 1997;Miller & Wolford, 1999;Verde & Rotello, 2003), mirror effects (Glanzer, Kim, & Adams, 1998;Greene, 1996;Hintzman, Caulton, & Curran, 1994;Hirshman, 1995;Stretch & Wixted, 1998), and subjective awareness and phenomenology (Donaldson, 1996;Dunn, 2004;Hirshman & Henzler, 1998;Rotello, Macmillan, Reeder, & Wong, 2005;Verde, 2004). Moreover, growing appreciation of the richly metacognitive nature of memory places pressure on formal memory models to treat decision processes in a substantive way.…”