Abstract
Source attributions for falsely remembered material were investigated in two experiments. A male and a female speaker each presented either an entire word list or half of the items from each of multiple Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) lists commonly used in this paradigm. In the latter condition the tendency of each list half to activate a nonpresented, critical list theme item was manipulated. All of the list halves differed in backward associative strength (BAS), and each was presented by one or the other of the two speakers. In these correlated conditions, when critical items were falsely recognized (Experiments 1 and 2) or recalled (Experiment 2), source attributions were more frequently made to the speaker of the list items with the higher average BAS. This source attribution effect appears to result from the binding of list item source characteristics to activated critical items during encoding, as opposed to being the result of a biased retrieval process. The results are interpreted as consistent with an activation/monitoring account of false memory in the DRM paradigm.
Article PDF
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
Anisfeld, M., &Knapp, M. (1968). Association, synonymity, and directionality in false recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology,77, 171–179.
Arndt, J., &Hirshman, E. (1998). True and false recognition in MINERVA2: Explanations from a global matching perspective.Journal of Memory & Language,39, 371–391.
Bower, G. H., Black, J. B., &Turner, T. J. (1979). Scripts in memory for text.Cognitive Psychology,11, 177–220.
Brainerd, C. J., Wright, R., Reyna, V. G., &Mojardin, A. H. (2001). Conjoint recognition and phantom recollection.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,27, 307–327.
Deese, J. (1959). On the prediction of occurrence of particular verbal intrusions in immediate recall.Journal of Experimental Psychology,58, 17–22.
Dodson, C. S., &Schacter, D. L. (2001). “If I had said it I would have remembered it”: Reducing false memories with a distinctiveness heuristic.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,8, 155–161.
Gallo, D. A., McDermott, K. B., Percer, J. M., &Roediger, H. L., III (2001). Modality effects in false recall and false recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,27, 339–353.
Graesser, A. C., &Nakamura, G. V. (1982). The impact of a schema on comprehension and memory. In G. H. Bower (Ed.),The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 16, pp. 59–109). New York: Academic Press.
Hicks, J. L., &Marsh, R. L. (1999). Attempts to reduce the incidence of false recall with source monitoring.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,25, 1195–1209.
Hicks, J. L., &Marsh, R. L. (2001). False recognition occurs more frequently during source identification than during old-new recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,27, 375–383.
Israel, L., &Schacter, D. L. (1997). Pictorial encoding reduces false recognition of semantic associates.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,4, 577–581.
Johnson, M. K., Foley, M. A., Suengas, A. G., &Raye, C. L. (1988). Phenomenal characteristics of memories for perceived and imagined autobiographical events.Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,117, 371–376.
Johnson, M. K., Hashtroudi, S., &Lindsay, D. S. (1993). Source monitoring.Psychological Bulletin,114, 3–28.
Johnson, M. K., &Raye, C. L. (1981). Reality monitoring.Psychological Review,88, 67–85.
Johnson, M. K., Raye, C. L., Foley, H. J., &Foley, M. A. (1981). Cognitive operations and decision bias in reality monitoring.American Journal of Psychology,94, 37–64.
Lampinen, J. M., Neuschatz, J. S., &Payne, D. G. (1999). Source attributions and false memories: A test of the demand characteristics account.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,6, 130–135.
Marsh, R. L., &Hicks, J. L. (2001). Output monitoring tests reveal false memories of memories that never existed.Memory,9, 39–51.
Mather, M., Henkel, L. A., &Johnson, M. K. (1997). Evaluating characteristics of false memories: Remember/know judgments and memory characteristics questionnaire compared.Memory & Cognition,25, 826–837.
McDermott, K. B. (1997). Priming on perceptual implicit memory tests can be achieved through presentation of associates.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,4, 582–586.
McEvoy, C. L., Nelson, D. L., &Komatsu, T. (1999). What’s the connection between true and false memories? The differential roles of interitem associations in recall and recognition.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,25, 1177–1194.
Norman, K. A., &Schacter, D. L. (1997). False recognition in younger and older adults: Exploring the characteristics of illusory memories.Memory & Cognition,25, 838–848.
Payne, D. G., Elie, C. J., Blackwell, J. M., &Neuschatz, J. S. (1996). Memory illusions: Recalling, recognizing, and recollecting events that never occurred.Journal of Memory & Language,35, 261–285.
Postman, L. J., &Keppel, G. (Eds.) (1970).Norms of word association. New York: Academic Press.
Reyna, V. F., &Brainerd, C. J. (1995). Fuzzy-trace theory: An interim synthesis.Learning & Individual Differences,7, 1–75.
Robinson, K. J., &Roediger, H. L., III (1997). Associative processes in false recall and false recognition.Psychological Science, 8, 231–237.
Roediger, H. L., III,Balota, D. A., &Watson, J. M. (2001). Spreading activation and the arousal of false memories. In H. L. Roediger, III, J. S. Nairne, I. Neath, & A. M. Surprenant (Eds.),The nature of remembering: Essays in honor of Robert G. Crowder (pp. 95–115). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Roediger, H. L., III, &McDermott, K. B. (1995). Creating false memories: Remembering words not presented in lists.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,21, 803–814.
Roediger, H. L., III,Watson, J. M., McDermott, K. B., &Gallo, D.A. (2001). Factors that determine false recall: A multiple regression analysis.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,8, 385–407.
Schacter, D. L., Israel, L., &Racine, C. (1999). Suppressing false recognition in younger and older adults: The distinctiveness heuristic.Journal of Memory & Language,40, 1–24.
Seamon, J. G., Luo, C. R., &Gallo, D. A. (1998). Creating false memories of words with or without recognition of list items: Evidence for nonconscious processes.Psychological Science,9, 20–26.
Smith, S. M., Tindell, D. R., Pierce, B. H., Gilliland, T. R., &Gerkens, D. R. (2001). The use of source memory to identify one’s own episodic confusion errors.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,27, 362–374.
Underwood, B. J. (1965). False recognition produced by implicit verbal responses.Journal of Experimental Psychology,70, 122–129.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Hicks, J.L., Hancock, T.W. Backward associative strength determines source attributions given to false memories. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 9, 807–815 (2002). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03196339
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03196339