Dissociation between the cognitive process and the phenomenological experience of TOT: effect of the anxiolytic drug lorazepam on TOT states

TOT states may be viewed as a temporary and reversible microamnesia. We investigated the effects of lorazepam on TOT states in response to general knowledge questions. The lorazepam participants produced more commission errors and more TOTs following commission errors than the placebo participants (although the rates did not change). The resolution of the TOTs was unimpaired by the drug. Neither feeling-of-knowing accuracy nor recognition were affected by lorazepam. The higher level of incorrect recalls produced by lorazepam participants may be due to the fact that they were more frequently temporarily unable to access a known item. For some of these items, the awareness of the retrieval failure resulted in a commission TOT (phenonemological TOT after a commission error). The resolution of the TOT conflict is discussed in the light of the anxiolytic and anticonflict effects of lorazepam. The data are discussed in terms of contemporary theories of TOTs and the effects that benzodiazepines have on semantic memory.     

From tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) data to theoretical implications in two steps: when more TOTs means better retrieval

Two experiments in which participants named pictured objects with difficult or easier names, and a reanalysis and review of published data, reveal that problematic measures used in previous studies obscured the implications of group differences in tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) rates. In Experiment 1, increased age led to more TOTs for difficult but not easy targets. In Experiment 2, bilinguals had more TOTs than monolinguals for easy targets but fewer TOTs for difficult targets. The authors developed a theoretically motivated measure that clarifies the implications of TOT data by linking all responses elicited in the TOT paradigm with either success or failure in completing 2 retrieval steps in current models of language production. The 2-step analysis reveals a common mechanism for the age and bilingualism effects and implies that age has both positive and negative effects on retrieval.     

What the tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) says about homophone frequency inheritance

The present study uses tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) states as a unique source of evidence to test the hypothesis of lexical access benefits for homophones--that is, whether low-frequency homophones, such as tee, inherit the lexical access benefits of their high-frequency homophonic counterparts, such as tea. We compared retrieval success rates for low-frequency homophones, for matched low-frequency controls, and for high-frequency controls with the combined frequency of the homophone set. In correct retrievals, low-frequency homophones behaved according to their specific frequency, not differing from the low-frequency controls. However, retrieval failures revealed a different kind of homophone effect. When retrieval failed for targets with a homophone partner, access difficulties tended to be less profound than for low-frequency controls, ending closer to target retrieval more often than low-frequency controls (at Step 2; in a self-resolved TOT or in a TOT with a strong feeling of knowing), and ending far away from target retrieval less often than low-frequency controls (at Step 1; in a notGOT). These results provide evidence against the notion of shared word-form representations for homophonic targets but leave open a door for a weaker form of homophone effects, possibly arising from feedback activation that influences retrieval only when access is sufficiently slowed (as when retrieval fails).     

Emotional mood states and retrieval in episodic memory

The effect of an experimentally induced depressed mood state on recall of target words embedded in sentences was examined. The objective was to determine if the induction of a depressed mood can affect output or retrieval from episodic memory. The experimental sequence was as follows: All subjects studied a list of either elaborated or base sentences, rating them for complexity, in an incidental retention paradigm; this was followed by the induction of a depressed or neutral (control) mood, using a standard and a short form of the Velten mood induction procedure; finally, subjects were given an unanticipated cued recall test of the target adjectives. In all tests, subjects showed a reduction in recall owing to the depressed mood, which provided evidence for retrieval effects of the mood state. Elaboration led to superior recall of target items, and there was no effect of delayed recall. The results are briefly discussed within the framework of a resource allocation theory.     

The relation of tip-of-the-tongue states and retrieval time

The tip-of-the-tongue state (TOT) is the phenomenological experience that a word is on the verge of being recalled. Participants rated TOTs as either emotional or nonemotional. In Experiment 1, given general-information questions, participants spent more time attempting retrieval during emotional TOTs than during nonemotional TOTs or n-TOTs (retrieval failures not accompanied by TOTs). Experiment 2 replicated the effect that TOTs show longer retrieval times than n-TOTs. In Experiment 3, with word definitions as stimuli, retrieval times were longer for emotional TOTs. Experiment 4 showed the same relation between retrieval times and TOTs even when participants made retrospective decisions about whether they had experienced a TOT before they retrieved the correct target. Valence of emotion was correlated with correct resolution of the TOT. These results are discussed in the context of a metacognitive model, in which TOTs serve to monitor and control cognition.     

Fact learning: How information accuracy,delay, and repeated testing change retention and retrieval experience

Previous classroom studies have shown that the phenomenology of studied facts changes over time. However, pedagogical needs preclude both the study of errors and the separation of the effects that delay and repeated testing have on retention and retrieval experience. We addressed these issues together in an experiment where participants read stories containing correct and misleading information and provided Remember, Just Know, and Familiar judgements on immediate and delayed general knowledge tests. After 2 days, information learned from the stories shifted from Remembered to Just Known, but repeated testing attenuated this shift. Interestingly, similar patterns of retrieval and phenomenology were observed for correct and misleading information with one important difference—the shift over time to Just Knowing was significantly greater for correct than for misleading information. Together, these findings show the roles of information accuracy, delay, and testing in determining both retention and the subjective experience of retrieval.     

Fact learning: how information accuracy, delay, and repeated testing change retention and retrieval experience

Previous classroom studies have shown that the phenomenology of studied facts changes over time. However, pedagogical needs preclude both the study of errors and the separation of the effects that delay and repeated testing have on retention and retrieval experience. We addressed these issues together in an experiment where participants read stories containing correct and misleading information and provided Remember, Just Know, and Familiar judgements on immediate and delayed general knowledge tests. After 2 days, information learned from the stories shifted from Remembered to Just Known, but repeated testing attenuated this shift. Interestingly, similar patterns of retrieval and phenomenology were observed for correct and misleading information with one important difference--the shift over time to Just Knowing was significantly greater for correct than for misleading information. Together, these findings show the roles of information accuracy, delay, and testing in determining both retention and the subjective experience of retrieval.     

Distinguishing states of awareness from confidence during retrieval: evidence from amnesia

Two experiments were conducted to determine whether recollective experience is distinguishable from confidence. In Experiment 1, we tested college participants in a within-subjects design and replicated Gardiner and Java's (1990) findings from a between-subjects design. We observed higher remember judgments for words than for nonwords, but higher know judgments for nonwords than for words. For confidence judgments, we obtained greater sure than unsure responses for both words and nonwords. In Experiment 2, we tested amnesic participants and matched control participants. Control participants produced the same pattern of results as college participants, but the results of amnesic participants diverged in an important way. For confidence judgments, the amnesic participants, like the control and college participants, made more sure than unsure judgments to both words and nonwords. But for recollective judgments, amnesic participants did not produce the crossover interaction for words and nonwords. This striking difference between the performance of memory-intact and amnesic participants demonstrates that recollective judgments and confidence that accompany retrieval are not isomorphic psychological experiences.     

Recipient mood states and helping behavior

Three studies investigated the effects of perceived recipient mood on helping behavior. Based upon Schwartz' (in Advances in experimental social psychology, Vol. 10, N.Y.: Academic Press, 1977) discussion of need-based helping, it was predicted that donors would perceive greater psychological need and would help more when the recipient's mood was negative than when it was neutral. These predictions were confirmed for females but not for males. The results also confirmed the hypothesis, derived from Schwartz (1977), that a negative recipient mood would elicit greater helping than a neutral recipient mood when this mood is perceived as changeable but not when it is perceived as unchangeable.     

Predicting behavior on a computer from intentions, attitudes, and experience

Research on computer attitudes has generally focused on describing the cognitive elements. The present study used the Ajzen and Fishbein model to predict intentions to work hard in a computer course and actual time on the computer. In addition, the influence of experience on predictions was examined. Results from 74 social science students showed that the Ajzen and Fishbein model is effective at predicting both intentions and behavior. Unlike previous findings, experience did not interact with attitudes. Finally, a short cognitive attitude scale was an additional significant predictor beyond intentions in explaining behavior variance.     

Remembering and knowing personality traits: figure/ground asymmetries in person-related retrieval experience

In two experiments, the effect of category salience on retrieval experience was investigated. In Experiment 1, participants rated typicality or concreteness of personality traits that differed in stereotype reference (i.e., consistent, inconsistent, and neutral in relation to the age stereotype). More remember judgments were given for consistent and inconsistent traits in contrast to neutral traits, thereby indicating a figure/ground asymmetry. In Experiment 2, neutral traits were excluded and a classical figure/ground phenomenon was demonstrated for the retrieval experience of traits (i.e., reversibility of an ambiguous figure after typicality and untypicality ratings). Altogether, the results suggest that metacognitive trait representations depend on principles of figure/ground asymmetries rather than on functional principles of social information processing.     

Sometimes-competing retrieval (SOCR): a formalization of the comparator hypothesis

Cue competition is one of the most studied phenomena in associative learning. However, a theoretical disagreement has long stood over whether it reflects a learning or performance deficit. The comparator hypothesis, a model of expression of Pavlovian associations, posits that learning is not subject to competition but that performance reflects a complex interaction of encoded associative strengths. That is, subjects respond to a cue to the degree that it signals a change in the likelihood or magnitude of reinforcement relative to that in the cue's absence. Initially, this performance-focused view was supported by studies showing that posttraining revaluation of a competing cue often influences responding to the target cue. However, recently developed learning-focused accounts of retrospective revaluation have revitalized the debate concerning cue competition. Further complicating the picture are phenomena of cue facilitation, which have been addressed less frequently than cue competition by formal models of conditioning of either class. The authors present a formalization and extension of the comparator hypothesis, which results in sharpened differentiation between it and the new learning-focused models.     

Match fitness: development, evolution, and behavior: comment on Frankenhuis and Del Giudice (2012)

The application of evolutionary thinking to human physical and psychological medicine suggests several pathways through which evolutionary processes affect risk of disease. Among these is the concept of mismatch between an individual and its environment, either because the environment has changed for the whole species (evolutionary novelty) or because the environment has changed for an individual during its lifetime (developmental mismatch). Here we set a discussion of maladaptation and mismatch as a cause of psychopathology (Frankenhuis & Del Giudice, 2012) in the broader framework of developmental plasticity and life history trade-offs.     

Self-focused attention,facial behavior,autonomic arousal and the experience of emotion

Two experiments examined alternative explanations for the Scheier and Carver(1977) results linking self-focused attention to increased responsivity to emotional stimuli. In both studies autonomic, expressive, and self-report measures of emotional arousal failed to confirm the earlier findings. An individual difference measure reported by others to parallel the effects of situationally manipulated self-attention also failed to confirm the previously reported findings. Though in direct contradiction to Scheier and Carver's results, the results are consistent with a facial feedback hypothesis and with previous findings on the effects of expressive inhibition on self-reports of emotional arousal.This research was supported in part by NSF grant 77-08926 to the first author and by NIMH grant MH 29446 to the third author, as well as by funds from the Lincoln Filene Endowment to Dartmouth College.     

Prospective memory: the relative effects of encoding, retrieval, and the match between encoding and retrieval

Previous prospective memory studies have revealed some important features of encoding, retrieval, and the match between the encoding and the retrieval that contribute to prospective memory performance. However, these studies have not provided evidence concerning the relative importance of these three factors because no study has investigated all three in a single design. We developed a laboratory-based paradigm that allowed us to manipulate different characteristics of encoding, retrieval, and the match between encoding and retrieval simultaneously in a single experiment. The results of eight experiments showed that all three factors have an influence on prospective memory performance, but that the match between encoding and retrieval has a significantly larger influence than either encoding or retrieval factors.     

Cultures of moderation and expression: emotional experience, behavior, and physiology in Chinese Americans and Mexican Americans

Ethnographic accounts suggest that emotions are moderated in Chinese cultures and expressed openly in Mexican cultures. The authors tested this notion by comparing subjective, behavioral, and physiological aspects of emotional responses to 3 (warned, unwarned, instructed to inhibit responding) aversive acoustic startle stimuli in 95 Chinese Americans and 64 Mexican Americans. Subjective reports were consistent with ethnographic accounts; Chinese Americans reported experiencing significantly less emotion than Mexican Americans across all 3 startle conditions. Evidence from a nonemotional task suggested that these differences were not artifacts of cultural differences in the use of rating scales. Few cultural differences were found in emotional behavior or physiology, suggesting that these aspects of emotion are less susceptible to cultural influence.     

Relation of game location and experience on mood states

The study investigated relationships between game location, performers' experience, and mood states. 31 experienced collegiate soccer players completed the Brunel Mood Scale to assess anger, calmness, confusion, depression, fatigue, happiness, tension, and vigor before eight competitive games (four home and four away). Participants were categorized into Experienced and Less Experienced groups, based on the level of performance at which they played. Repeated-measures multivariate analyses of variance compared mean mood scores across location and experience, and follow-up univariate analyses suggested the increase in mood scores on Tension and decrease in scores on Calmness, Happiness, and Vigor between playing away and at home were significantly greater for Less experienced soccer players than Experienced players. Implications of these findings for the applied practitioner are discussed.