Indirect object recognition: evidence for associative processes in recognition memory

Rats' exploration of stimulus P (e.g., a domestic object) is reduced following either its direct exposure or its indirect exposure and is taken to indicate recognition memory. Procedures for demonstrating indirect object recognition involve an initial presentation of object P with stimulus X (and of an object Q with stimulus Y). On test, stimulus X is presented with objects P and Q and rats' exploration of Q exceeds their exploration of P. One interpretation here is that the presentation of stimulus X on test associatively activates the memory of object P, which diminishes exploration of P relative to Q. It is possible, instead, that performance is simply the result of a novel pattern of stimulation generated by the unfamiliar combination of X and Q. The authors modified this procedure to reduce the likelihood of such a process. Their procedure involved first the presentation of PX and QY before the presentation of stimulus X alone. During the test that followed, objects P and Q were presented but stimulus X was removed. The authors found that exploration of Q remained greater than that of P despite these modifications and discuss some theoretical implications of indirect, associative processes in recognition memory.     

On the nature of associative information in recognition memory

In a typical associative-recognition task, participants must distinguish between intact word pairs (both words previously studied together) and rearranged word pairs (both words previously studied but as part of different pairs). The familiarity of the individual items on this task is uninformative because all of the items were seen before, so the only way to solve the task is to rely on associative information. Prior research suggests that associative information is recall-like in nature and may therefore be an all-or-none variable. The present research reports several experiments in which some pairs were strengthened during list presentation. The resulting hit rates and false alarm rates, and an analysis of the corresponding receiver operating characteristic plots, suggest that participants rely heavily on item information when making an associative-recognition decision (to no avail) and that associative information may be best thought of as a some-or-none variable.     

Simple and associative recognition memory in the hippocampal region

Although it is well established that the hippocampal region is involved in the formation of declarative memory, the exact nature of its involvement is unclear. One view is that the hippocampal region is involved only in tasks that require the formation or use of associations. According to this view, the hippocampal region is not involved in traditional tests of recognition memory. An alternative view is that the hippocampal region combines and extends the processing carried out by structures in the parahippocampal gyrus and that it is involved in all forms of declarative memory, including recognition memory. Using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we observed hippocampal activity during both traditional and associative recognition memory tasks. Critically, the hippocampal region was no more active in the associative recognition task than in the traditional recognition task.     

Cuing effects and associative information in recognition memory

Item recognition requires discrimination of studied words from nonstudied words. Associative recognition requires subjects to discriminate studied word groups from recombinations of words from different groups. Cued recognition requires the same old-new discrimination as item recognition, but list items are presented as cues along with the test item. The results from three experiments show (1) little or no effect of cuing for low-frequency words, but (2) positive cuing effects for high-frequency words; (3) increasing levels of overall performance with increases in study time, but (4) unchanging effects of cuing with study time; and (5) stronger positive cuing effects for two cues than for one cue. Five models (Independent Cue Model, Matrix model, MINERVA 2, SAM, and TODAM) were fit to the data of Experiment 1. Each model has trouble with at least one aspect of the results. Theoretical implications and modifications are discussed at length.     

Recognition memory for faces: When familiarity supports associative recognition judgments

Recognition memory for single items can be dissociated from recognition memory for the associations between items. For example, recognition tests for single words produce curvilinear receiver operating characteristics (ROCs), but associative recognition tests for word pairs produce linear ROCs. These dissociations are consistent with dual-process theories of recognition and suggest that associative recognition relies on recollection but that item recognition relies on a combination of recollection and assessments of familiarity. In the present study, we examined associative recognition ROCs for facial stimuli by manipulating the central and external features, in order to determine whether linear ROCs would be observed for stimuli other than arbitrary word pairs. When the faces were presented upright, familiarity estimates were significantly above zero, and the associative ROCs were curvilinear, suggesting that familiarity contributed to associative judgments. However, presenting the faces upside down effectively eliminated the contribution of familiarity to associative recognition, and the ROCs were linear. The results suggest that familiarity can support associative recognition judgments, if the associated components are encoded as a coherent gestalt, as in upright faces.     

Selective attention in human associative learning and recognition memory

Four experiments examined the role of selective attention in a new causal judgment task that allowed measurement of both causal strength and cue recognition. In Experiments 1 and 2, blocking was observed; pretraining with 1 cue (A) resulted in reduced learning about a 2nd cue (B) when those 2 cues were trained in compound (AB+). Participants also demonstrated decreased recognition performance for the causally redundant Cue B, suggesting that less attention had been paid to it in training. This is consistent with the idea that attention is preferentially allocated toward the more predictive Cue A, and away from the less predictive Cue B (e.g., N. J. Mackintosh, 1975). Contrary to this hypothesis, in Experiments 3 and 4, participants demonstrated poorer recognition for the most predictive cues, relative to control cues. A new model, which is based on N. J. Mackintosh's (1975) model, is proposed to account for the observed relationship between the extent to which each cue is attended to, learned about, and later recognized     

The level of cholinergic nucleus basalis activation controls the specificity of auditory associative memory

Learning involves not only the establishment of memory per se, but also the specific details of its contents. In classical conditioning, the former concerns whether an association was learned while the latter discloses what was learned. The neural bases of associativity have been studied extensively while neural mechanisms of memory specificity have been neglected. Stimulation of the cholinergic nucleus basalis (NBs) paired with a preceding tone induces CS-specific associative memory. As different levels of acetylcholine may be released naturally during different learning situations, we asked whether the level of activation of the cholinergic neuromodulatory system can control the degree of detail that is encoded and retrieved. Adult male rats were tested pre- and post-training for behavioral responses (interruption of ongoing respiration) to tones of various frequencies (1-15 kHz, 70 dB, 2 s). Training consisted of 200 trials/day of tone (8.0 kHz, 70 dB, 2 s) either paired or unpaired with NBs (CS-NBs = 1.8 s) at moderate (65.7+/-9.0 microA, one day) or weak (46.7+/-12.1 microA, three training days) levels of stimulation, under conditions of controlled behavioral state (pre-trial stable respiration rate). Post-training (24 h) responses to tones revealed that moderate activation induced both associative and CS-specific behavioral memory, whereas weak activation produced associative memory lacking frequency specificity. The degree of memory specificity 24 h after training was positively correlated with the magnitude of CS-elicited increase in gamma activity within the EEG during training, but only in the moderate NBs group. Thus, a low level of acetylcholine released by the nucleus basalis during learning is sufficient to induce associativity whereas a higher level of release enables the storage of greater experiential detail. gamma waves, which are thought to reflect the coordinated activity of cortical cells, appear to index the encoding of CS detail. The findings demonstrate that the amount of detail in memory can be directly controlled by neural intervention.     

从整合的角度看联结记忆中的项目再认

联结记忆由三种成分构成：项目1, 项目2以及项目1-项目2之间的联结, 其中, 对项目1和项目2的再认称之为项目再认, 而对项目1-项目2之间联结的再认称之为联结再认。双加工理论认为项目再认可以由熟悉性和回想加工来完成, 而联结再认只能由回想加工来完成。但近期有大量的研究发现：当要学习的项目对被整合为一个新的整体表征时, 熟悉性也能够支持联结再认。而关于整合对联结记忆中项目再认的研究较少, 总结已有研究提出两种观点：一种是“只有受益”观点(benefits-only)认为整合在增加联结再认的同时不影响项目再认; 另一种是“收支平衡”观点(costs and benefits)认为整合增加联结再认是以牺牲项目再认为代价的。未来研究应该关注整合对联结记忆中项目再认的影响及其神经机制, 了解整合对联结再认和项目再认的具体作用, 有助于针对具体记忆任务选择合适的编码方式来提高记忆表现。     

Semantic relations differentially impact associative recognition memory: Electrophysiological evidence

Though associative recognition memory is thought to rely primarily on recollection, recent research indicates that familiarity might also make a substantial contribution when to-be-learned items are integrated into a coherent structure by means of an existing semantic relation. It remains unclear how different types of semantic relations, such as categorical (e.g., dancer–singer) and thematic (e.g., dancer–stage) relations might affect associative recognition, however. Using event-related potentials (ERPs), we addressed this question by manipulating the type of semantic link between paired words in an associative recognition memory experiment. An early midfrontal old/new effect, typically linked to familiarity, was observed across the relation types. In contrast, a robust left parietal old/new effect was found in the categorical condition only, suggesting a clear contribution of recollection to associative recognition for this kind of pairs. One interpretation of this pattern is that familiarity was sufficiently diagnostic for associative recognition of thematic relations, which could result from the integrative nature of the thematic relatedness compared to the similarity-based nature of categorical pairs. The present study suggests that the extent to which recollection and familiarity are involved in associative recognition is at least in part determined by the properties of semantic relations between the paired associates.     

The effects of cholinergic drugs upon recognition memory in rats

This study measured the effects of the muscarinic blocker, scopolamine, upon object recognition. In order to test object recognition, rats were trained to choose between two distinctive goal boxes, one of which was familiar, and the other was novel. Selection of the unfamiliar goal box was always rewarded (nonmatching-to-sample), and new pairs of start/goal boxes were used on every trial.

In the first experiment it was found that injections of 0.05 mg/kg scopolamine hydrochloride and above produced significant impairments on this nonspatial test of working memory. A second experiment examined whether scopolamine caused a loss of retention by comparing the effects of the drug when the interval between stimulus presentation and choice test was increased from just over 0 sec to 60 sec. While the highest dose of scopolamine hydrobromide (0.06 mg/kg) was sufficient to produce a significant impairment on the longer retention interval, there was no evidence that this dose produced faster forgetting of the stimuli. This result suggests that the drug caused a general depression in performance, which may or may not reflect amnesic properties. In contrast, simultaneous tests with the anticholinesterase, physostigmine, indicated that increasing available acetyl choline might attenuate the effects of the retention intervals. A final series of control tests revealed that the rats relied on cues from a variety of sensory modalities in order to perform the nonmatching task.     

The role of associative strength in children's false memory illusions

The effects of associative strength on rates of 7- and 11-year-old children's true and false memories were examined when category and Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) lists were used to cue the same critical lure. Backward associative strength (BAS) was varied such that the category and DRM lists had the same strength (DRM=category), DRM lists had more BAS (DRM>category), or category lists had more BAS (DRM<category). If BAS drives children's false memories then BAS, not the type of relation across items in a list, should determine false memory production. The results confirmed this prediction using both recall and recognition measures: (1) both true and false memories increased with age, (2) true memory was better for category than DRM lists but there were no differences for false memory, and (3) at all ages, false memories varied predictably with changes in BAS but were unaffected by list-type manipulations. These findings are discussed in the context of models of false memory development.     

The role of imagery in recognition memory for sentences

The effects of sentence imageability were examined in a test of continuous recognition memory following meaningful orienting tasks which emphasized verbal or imagery encoding. The results showed that distractors changed in syntactic form were more accurately identified for abstract than for concrete sentences, while memory for meaning was equally accurate for both sentence types. The orienting task manipulation did not affect this pattern of results. These data extend previous reports (Begg and Paivio 1969) by demonstrating qualitative differences in memory for concrete and abstract sentences when full comprehension of the stimulus material is required. The results are consistent with the dual coding hypothesis (Paivio 1971) but not with propositional models of memory (Anderson and Bower 1973).     

Proactive interference and concurrent inhibitory processes do not differentially affect item and associative recognition: Implication for the age-related associative memory deficit

Previous studies have suggested an associative deficit hypothesis [Naveh-Benjamin, M. (2000 Naveh-Benjamin, M., &; Guez, J. (2000). The effects of divided attention on encoding and retrieval processes: Assessment of attentional costs and a componential analysis. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 26(6), 1461–1482.[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). Adult age differences in memory performance: Tests of an associative deficit hypothesis. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 26, 1170–1187] to explain age-related episodic memory declines. The hypothesis attributes part of the deficient episodic memory performance in older adults to a difficulty in creating and retrieving cohesive episodes. In this article, we further evaluate this hypothesis by testing two alternative processes that potentially mediate associative memory deficits in older adults. Four experiments are presented that assess whether failure of inhibitory processes (proactive interference in Experiments 1 and 2), and concurrent inhibition (in Experiments 3 and 4) are mediating factors in age-related associative deficits. The results suggest that creating conditions that require the operation of inhibitory processes, or that interfere with such processes, cannot simulate associative memory deficit in older adults. Instead, such results support the idea that associative memory deficits reflect a unique binding failure in older adults. This failure seems to be independent of other cognitive processes, including inhibitory and other resource-demanding processes.     

Effects of aging and divided attention on recognition memory processes for single and associative information

In the divided attention paradigm to test age-related associative memory deficits, whether the effects of divided attention occur at encoding or retrieval has not been clarified, and the effect on retention has not been studied. This study explored whether and how much divided attention at either encoding, retention, or retrieval diminished accuracy in recognizing a single feature (object or location) and associated features (object+location) by 23 elderly people (13 women; M age = 70.6 yr., SD = 2.8) recruited from a neighborhood community circle, and 29 female college students (M age = 20.8 yr., SD = 1.1). The results showed a significant decline in memory performance for both age groups due to divided attention in location and associative memory at retention, suggesting that the retention process demands attentional resources. Overall, regardless of their relative deficiency in associative memory, older adults showed an effect of divided attention comparable to that of younger adults in a recognition task.     

Judgments of associative memory

Judgments of associative memory (JAM) were indexed by ratings given to pairs of cue and response words. The normed probabilities, p(response|cue), were obtained from free association norms. The ratings were linearly related to the probabilities. The JAM functions were characterized by high intercepts ( approximately 50 on a 100 point scale) and shallow slopes (<0.5). The JAM function generalized across materials and method of rating. The function was not affected by expectancies or semantic similarity. Attempts to alter the function by making alternative responses more available were unsuccessful. A computer simulation model (MINERVA 2) exhibited the linear JAM function and successfully accounted for more complex phenomena (like the joint influence of forward and backward associative strengths on ratings). The shallow JAM slope appears to result from a fundamental lack of discrimination among associative strengths. The high intercept appears to result partly from an independent post-mnemonic source of bias producing over-estimation of association.     

The associative memory deficit of older adults: the role of strategy utilization

Past research has established an associative deficit hypothesis (e.g., M. Naveh-Benjamin, 2000) that attributes part of older adults' poor episodic memory performance to their difficulty in creating and retrieving cohesive episodes. Here, the authors evaluate the degree to which this deficit can be reduced by older adults' use of associative strategies. Young and older adults learned word pairs under either intentional-learning instructions or instructions eliciting associative strategies either at encoding or both at encoding and at retrieval, and they then took tests on their memory for both the components and the associations. Results replicated the associative deficit of older adults under intentional-learning instructions. In addition, they showed that instructions to use appropriate associative strategies during either encoding or, even more so, during encoding and retrieval resulted in a significant decrease in the associative deficit. The theoretical and applied implications of these results are discussed.     

一体化促进联结记忆的作用机制：熟悉性和回想加工

当两个或两个以上项目进行一体化编码时, 熟悉性也能够支持联结再认, 这一观点已经得到大量研究证据的支持。然而, 关于一体化如何影响联结再认和构成联结的单个项目再认仍存在分歧。通过回顾现有研究发现：(1)一体化一致性是调节一体化与联结再认关系的重要因素; (2)认知资源有限和新/旧词语义相关性是影响一体化对项目再认作用的重要因素; (3)一体化的发生机制存在“项目假说”、“图式假说”以及“精细加工假说”三种可能的理论解释。未来研究不仅需要控制一体化一致性, 还可以比较不同一体化方式的作用大小以及探索一体化效应的毕生发展规律。     

The role of familiarity in item recognition, associative recognition, and plurality recognition on self-paced and speeded tests

Four experiments compare the effect of familiarity on item, associative, and plurality recognition on self-paced and speeded tests. The familiarity of test items was enhanced by presenting a prime that matched the subsequent test item. On item and plurality recognition tests, participants were more likely to respond "old" to primed than to unprimed test items. In associative recognition, priming increased the proportion of old responses on a speeded test, but not on a self-paced test. This suggests that familiarity plays a larger role in item and plurality recognition than in associative recognition on self-paced tests. On speeded tests, priming has a similar effect on item, associative, and plurality recognition. Results suggest that item and associative recognition rely differentially on familiarity and recollection. They are also consistent with recent evidence suggesting that different processes underlie plurality and associative recognition.     

Reflections of the mirror effect for item and associative recognition

In five experiments, participants studied pairs of words and yes/no recognition memory for both item and associative information was tested. Two stimulus manipulations, nouns versus nonnouns and high versus low word concreteness, produced the mirror effect for both item and associative recognition. The mirror effect was reflected in both measures of accuracy and response latency. A word frequency manipulation, however, produced the mirror effect only for item recognition. Two additional experiments showed that the mirror effect could also be obtained between nouns and nonnouns and between high and low concrete words for associative recognition in a forced-choice recognition procedure. The results extend the generality of the mirror effect to measures of response latency and to associative recognition and also suggest that similar retrieval and decision processes underlie recognition of item and associative information.