The effects of report option and inter-target association on memory and metamemory performance in cued and uncued recall of paired associates: A generate-recognize approach

Abstract

The current research aimed to answer two main research questions. First, do variations in report-criterion option have differential effects on observing what is indeed remembered? Second, does increasing the inter-relatedness between target items have the same facilitative effect on metamemory just like it does on retrieval, or does it deteriorate in the same way as metacognitive monitoring measured by type-2 signal detection theory (dissociation)? Contrary to some earlier findings, Experiments 1 and 2 showed that participants do indeed withhold some correct responses due to the stringent report criterion. As a result, they report more correct responses when report option is maximally liberal (e.g., forced report) compared to a stringent report-criterion (freereport) particularly in uncued recall (Experiment 2). Experiment 3 found that when participants are encouraged to study cue-target pairs by focusing on targets more, intertarget association (ITA) is utilised to retrieve target items at retrieval. Thus, whilst retrieval of targets is facilitated, monitoring of the responses is not. Experiment 4 clearly showed a dissociation between memory and metacognitive monitoring due to high-ITA. Experiment 5, then, confirmed that the dissociation emerges due to the utilization of ITA by showing that it is attenuated in cued recall via ‘individuating’ the pairs (e.g., by interactive imagery). Confirming that the semantic context in which the target items studied is the critical factor to yield the observed dissociation, Experiment 6 showed that it is a strategic process that leads to the dissociation rather than solely an automatic process that facilitates retrieval of related targets by semantic activation. The results of the experiments were in line with the expectations of generate-recognize models (e.g., Bahrick, 1970) and showed that type-2 signal detection theory, which is based on this model, is an effective tool to investigate both memory and metamemory performance. The results were discussed with regards to the related literature.

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ORCID for Philip A. Higham: orcid.org/0000-0001-6087-7224

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