Short-Term Phantom Recollection in 8-10-Year-Olds and Young Adults.

Illusory conscious experience of the "presentation" of unstudied material, called phantom recollection, occurs at high levels in long-term episodic memory tests and underlies some forms of false memory. We report an experiment examining, for the first time, the presence of phantom recollection in a short-term working memory (WM) task in 8- to 10-year-old children and young adults. Participants studied lists of eight semantically related words and had to recognize them among unpresented distractors semantically related and unrelated to the studied words after a retention interval of a few seconds. Regardless of whether the retention interval was filled with a concurrent task that interfered with WM maintenance, the false recognition rate for related distractors was very high in both age groups, although it was higher in young adults (47%) than children (42%) and rivaled the rate of target acceptance. The conjoint recognition model of fuzzy-trace theory was used to examine memory representations underlying recognition responses. In young adults, phantom recollection underpinned half of the false memories. By contrast, in children, phantom recollection accounted for only 16% of them. These findings suggest that an increase in phantom recollection use may underlie the developmental increase in short-term false memory.

Children's gist-based false memory in working memory tasks.

False memories are well established episodic memory phenomena. Recent research in young adults has shown that semantically related associates can be falsely remembered as studied items in working memory (WM) tasks for lists of only a few items when a short 4-second interval was given between study and test. The present study reported two experiments yielding similar effects in 4- (n = 32 and 33, 18 and 14 females, respectively) and 8-year-old children (n = 33 and 34, respectively, 19 females in both). Short lists of semantically related items specifically tailored for young children were retained over a brief interval. Whether or not the interval was filled with a concurrent task that impeded or not WM maintenance, younger children were as prone to falsely recognize related distractors as their older counterparts in an immediate recognition test, and also in a delayed test. In addition, using the conjoint recognition model of the fuzzy-trace theory, we demonstrated that the retrieval of gist traces of the list themes was responsible for the occurrence of short-term false memories in 4- and 8-year-old children. Gist memory also underpinned the occurrence of false recognition in the delayed test. These findings suggest that young children are as likely to make gist-based false memories as older children in working memory tasks. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Toward a New Approach to Investigate the Role of Working Memory in Stereotype Threat Effects.

Stereotype threat arises when the activation of negative stereotypes about a group impairs performance of stigmatized individuals on stereotype relevant tasks. There is ample evidence that stereotype threat leads to performance detriments by consuming executive resources. Several studies indeed showed that working memory (WM) mediates stereotype threat effects among young adults. More recently, researchers have sought to understand whether the same mechanisms underlie age-based stereotype threat, but findings are mixed regarding the role of WM and some authors rather favor a motivational explanation based on regulatory fit. The present review critically appraises the empirical support for distinct forms of stereotype threat effects mediated by distinct mechanisms. We propose a novel approach based on one of the most recent WM models, the time-based resource sharing model, to evaluate the impact of stereotype threat on attentional resources in WM among both young and older adults.

Role of attention in the associative relatedness effect in verbal working memory: Behavioral and chronometric perspectives.

Long-term semantic memory (LTM) is known for affecting recall during working memory (WM) tasks. However, the way LTM intervenes in WM remains unknown. Moreover, the available findings are incongruent concerning how attention modulates the impact of LTM on WM. To examine this issue, the involvement of LTM representations in a complex span task was manipulated through variations of the associative relatedness of memory items, while the attentional demand of the concurrent task was varied. Children and young adults were also compared, because children are less efficient in using refreshing for maintenance than adults. Despite the impact of the three main factors on recall performance, which was better for related than unrelated words, with the low rather than the high demanding concurrent task and for adults than children, there was no interaction between associative relatedness and attentional demand, neither in children nor in adults. We replicated these results in a second experiment with a more attention-demanding concurrent task. Moreover, analyses of recall latency showed that adults were faster than children at recalling words and both age groups were faster for related (vs. unrelated) words, but there was no effect of the concurrent attentional demand on recall latency and no interaction. Finally, errors were mostly omissions and transpositions, both more prevalent under high concurrent attentional demand. The present findings suggest that the availability of attention does not modulate the effect of LTM on WM. We discuss how WM models can account for this finding and how LTM can act on WM functioning. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Age-related changes in controllable and uncontrollable processes underlying evaluative conditioning: A comparison between children ages 7 to 11 and young adults.

Evaluative conditioning (EC) refers to a change in liking of a conditioned stimulus (CS) consecutive to its repeated pairing with a valent unconditioned stimulus (US). We relied on a multinomial processing tree model to compare the processes underlying EC in middle-aged children (n = 57, Mage = 8.65, range = 6.94-11.03; 31 females) and young adults (n = 57, Mage = 19.16, range = 17.60-23.60; 53 females). We found that controllable and uncontrollable valence transfer processes concurrently contributed to EC in adults and provided initial evidence that they are already present in children. Moreover, the experiment revealed that both types of processes are weaker in children than in adults and that controllable processes are stronger in older children than in younger ones. These findings suggest that both controllable and uncontrollable processes already underlie EC in middle-aged children but that they continue to mature after childhood. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Verbatim and gist memory in aging.

The ability to remember episodic details of prior events declines with normal aging. The present study aimed to determine whether these declines are restricted to verbatim traces of items per se or extend to gist traces of their meaning. Younger (n = 63) and older adults (n = 46) studied a list including related (strong gist activation) and unrelated words (weak gist activation) and performed a recognition test consisting of targets, related distractors, and unrelated distractors. Gist memory increased from the strong relative to the weak gist condition in both age groups. Whereas both younger and older adults could retrieve gist traces of the targeted words, older adults were impaired in their ability to retrieve their verbatim traces, resulting in increased false recognition of the related distractors. These findings suggest an age-related decrease in the ability to retrieve verbatim details of the past episodes accompanied by an increase in reliance on gist memory. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Distinguishing the role of conscious and unconscious knowledge in evaluative conditioning.

Evaluative conditioning (EC) refers to a change in liking of a conditioned stimulus (CS) subsequent to its repeated pairing with a valent stimulus (US). Two studies that bring new light on the highly debated question of the role of awareness in EC were conducted. We developed an innovative method motivated by higher order and integration theories of consciousness to distinguish between the role of conscious and unconscious knowledge about the pairings. On each trial of the awareness test, participants had to indicate the valence of the US associated with a given CS and to make a 'structural knowledge attribution' by reporting the basis of their response. Valence identification accuracy was used to evaluate knowledge while the knowledge attribution was used to measure the conscious status of knowledge. Memory attribution indicated conscious knowledge about the pairings while feeling-based and random attributions indicated unconscious knowledge. A meta-analysis of the two studies revealed that valence identification accuracy was above chance level for memory and feeling-based attributions but not for the random attribution. EC was found in the three attributions. While EC effect size was medium for the memory attribution it was small for feeling-based and random attributions. Moreover, Experiment 2 included a delayed test. EC was still present 24 h after the conditioning took place. The results obtained for memory and feeling-based attributions suggest that both conscious and unconscious knowledge may underlie EC. The results obtained for random attribution suggest that EC may also occur without any knowledge of US valence.

The primacy order effect in complex decision making.

The goal of the present study was to assess the role of information order in situations of complex decision making in which participants have to process a large amount of information (e.g., Dijksterhuis et al. Science 311(5763): 1005-1007, 2006). In two experiments, participants were presented with information about four cars, each characterized by 12 attributes. Immediately following the presentation of the 48 sentences describing these four cars, participants had to choose the one they would prefer to purchase. Two cars shared exactly the same positive and negative attributes, but they were displayed in a different order for each car. For one car, positive attributes were systematically displayed at the beginning while it was the reverse for the other car. The two remaining cars were used as fillers and had a lower number of positive attributes than the target cars in Experiment 1 and a higher number of positive attributes in Experiment 2. Results revealed a massive effect of information order with a clear preference for the car with positive information presented at the beginning. The second experiment further showed that this order effect was maintained and still strong even if the target cars did not have more positive attributes than the filler cars. Interestingly, in both experiments, participants never noticed that two cars were exactly characterized by the same list of attributes. These data clearly demonstrate that information order is a critical factor in complex decision-making situations involving a large amount of information.

On the memory processes underlying conscious deliberation in complex decision making: the role of verbatim and gist memory.

Studies showed that a distraction period improves complex decision making relative to a conscious deliberation period or an immediate choice. Although this counterintuitive finding was replicated several times, many other studies failed to find any beneficial effect of distraction and some even showed situations in which conscious deliberation was more effective. We suggest that studies showing a conscious thought advantage share several features that may have fostered the encoding and the retrieval of precise verbatim representations of the choice alternatives. The effectiveness of conscious deliberation could thus depend on the availability of verbatim memory. To test this hypothesis, we varied the availability of verbatim memory for the attributes of various equivalent alternatives by introducing, for half of the participants, a time delay between the presentation of the alternatives and of a fictitious client request that provides a normative criterion to evaluate them. Verbatim memory declined, whereas gist memory increased in the delay relative to the no delay condition. Moreover, there was a detrimental effect of delay in the deliberation condition but not in the distraction and the immediate decision conditions. Both verbatim memory and decision quality after deliberation were affected by the introduction of a delay which suggests that verbatim memory underlies conscious thought effectiveness.

False memory at short and long term.

False memories are well-established long-term memory (LTM) phenomena. Recent reports of false recognition at short term suggest that working memory (WM) could also give rise to false memories, supporting the unitary view of memory. Alternatively, we hypothesized that the emergence of false memories at short term results from the impairment of WM maintenance, memory performance relying then on LTM. More specifically, we assumed that false memories rely on the retrieval of gist traces of the memory items while their verbatim traces that could block false memories are no longer accessible. To test this proposal, we reported a series of 4 experiments in which the availability of 2 WM maintenance mechanisms, articulatory rehearsal and attentional refreshing, was manipulated, and the reliance of recognition performance on gist and verbatim traces was also assessed. In line with our hypothesis, the occurrence of false memories in immediate recognition test was accompanied by the reduction of verbatim memory retrieval resulting from the impairment of rehearsal. By contrast, false memories in the delayed test depended on gist memory, which was strengthened by the use of refreshing. These findings support an integrated account of false memories at short and long term, shed light on the nature of mental representations generated by WM maintenance mechanisms and on the relationships between WM and LTM. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Attentional refreshing moderates the word frequency effect in immediate and delayed recall tasks.

Using an online sample experiment, the study described herein addresses the fervent debate about the relationships between working memory and long-term memory (LTM). We manipulated refreshing opportunities and LTM status of memoranda by varying, respectively, the type of span tasks (simple span with short or long lists versus complex span tasks) and the frequency of the memory words (low versus high). In accordance with the hypothesis that refreshing is involved particularly in complex rather than simple span tasks, the frequency effect in immediate recall tests was reduced in the former. Moreover, contrary to previous studies in which refreshing increases LTM effects in delayed recall tests, our data point in the opposite direction. However, the frequency effect was also reduced in the simple task with short lists, suggesting that refreshing might not be the only process underlying the reduction of frequency effect in delayed tests. Finally, no differences in delayed recall were found between the complex span task that affords refreshing opportunities and the other tasks, suggesting that another process than refreshing, probably consolidation, might be involved in delayed recall.

The role of gist and verbatim memory in complex decision making: Explaining the unconscious-thought effect.

Previous research showed that the unconscious-thought effect, which refers to an improvement in complex decision making following a distraction period, was moderated by the presentation format of pieces of information about different options. The aim of the current study was to replicate this finding and further examine the memory representations underlying decision making following a distraction or a deliberation period. Results showed that, when the information was presented blocked per option, participants were better able to differentiate the best option from the others after a distraction period than immediately after the information presentation or after a deliberation period. In addition, distracted participants retrieved more gist representations of the options when the information was presented per option. By contrast, participants were better able to differentiate the best option from the others after a deliberation period when the information was presented per attribute. Participants who deliberated also retrieved more verbatim representations when the information was presented per attribute. Finally, mediation analyses indicated that the accuracy of the evaluations of the options depends on gist memory when distracted but on verbatim memory when deliberating. These findings suggest that the effectiveness of distraction or deliberation depends on the memory representations of the different options. (PsycINFO Database Record

Information presentation format moderates the unconscious-thought effect: The role of recollection.

The unconscious-thought effect occurs when distraction improves complex decision-making. In two experiments using the unconscious-thought paradigm, we investigated the effect of presentation format of decision information (i) on memory for decision-relevant information and (ii) on the quality of decisions made after distraction, conscious deliberation or immediately. We used the process-dissociation procedure to measure recollection and familiarity. The two studies showed that presenting information blocked per criterion led participants to recollect more decision-relevant details compared to a presentation by option. Moreover, a Bayesian meta-analysis of the two studies provided strong evidence that conscious deliberation resulted in better decisions when the information was presented blocked per criterion and substantial evidence that distraction improved decision quality when the information was presented blocked per option. Finally, Study 2 revealed that the recollection of decision-relevant details mediated the effect of presentation format on decision quality in the deliberation condition. This suggests that recollection contributes to conscious deliberation efficacy.

Interactivity fosters Bayesian reasoning without instruction.

Successful statistical reasoning emerges from a dynamic system including: a cognitive agent, material artifacts with their actions possibilities, and the thoughts and actions that are realized while reasoning takes place. Five experiments provide evidence that enabling the physical manipulation of the problem information (through the use of playing cards) substantially improves statistical reasoning, without training or instruction, not only with natural frequency statements (Experiment 1) but also with single-event probability statements (Experiment 2). Improved statistical reasoning was not simply a matter of making all sets and subsets explicit in the pack of cards (Experiment 3), it was not merely due to the discrete and countable layout resulting from the cards manipulation, and it was not mediated by participants' level of engagement with the task (Experiment 5). The positive effect of an increased manipulability of the problem information on participants' reasoning performance was generalizable both over problems whose numeric properties did not map perfectly onto the cards and over different types of cards (Experiment 4). A systematic analysis of participants' behaviors revealed that manipulating cards improved performance when reasoners spent more time actively changing the presentation layout "in the world" as opposed to when they spent more time passively pointing at cards, seemingly attempting to solve the problem "in their head." Although they often go unnoticed, the action possibilities of the material artifacts available and the actions that are realized on those artifacts are constitutive of successful statistical reasoning, even in adults who have ostensibly reached cognitive maturity.

The effect of the cognitive demands of the distraction task on unconscious thought.

The unconscious-thought effect occurs when distraction improves complex decision making. Recent studies suggest that this effect is more likely to occur with low- than high-demanding distraction tasks. We discuss implications of these findings for Newell & Shanks' (N&S's) claim that evidence is lacking for the intervention of unconscious processes in complex decision making.

Gist memory in the unconscious-thought effect.

The unconscious-thought effect (UTE) occurs when people are better able to make complex decisions after a period of distraction rather than immediately or after a period of conscious deliberation. This finding has often been interpreted as evidence of unconscious thinking. In two experiments, we provided the first evidence that the UTE is accompanied by enhanced memory for the gist of decision-relevant attributes and demonstrated that the cognitive demands of a distraction task moderate its effect on decision making and gist memory. It was only following a low-demand distraction task that participants chose the best alternative more often and displayed enhanced gist memory for decision-relevant attributes. These findings suggest that the UTE occurs only if cognitive resources are available and that it is accompanied by enhanced organization of information in memory, as shown by the increase in gist memory.