Recollective Experience During Recognition of Emotional Words in Clinical Depression

Earlier work has shown that free recall tasks produce a robust mood-congruent memory effect in depression, whereas recognition tasks produce heterogeneous results. This study aimed to further investigate recognition memory for positive, negative and neutral words in depressed patients and matched comparison participants with the Remember/Know/Guess procedure for assessing recollection and familiarity. No mood-congruent memory bias effect was detected in discrimination abilities. However, depressed patients recollected (more Remember responses) more negative than positive or neutral words, whereas comparison participants recollected more positive than neutral words. No mood-congruent pattern was evidenced for Know responses. However, the depressed patients responded to fewer words overall with Know responses than the comparison participants. These results suggest that the mood-congruent memory pattern in depressed patients is related to conscious recollection rather than to familiarity. Attentional biases toward negative words and elaboration processes and/or encoding in reference to the self may contribute to these findings.     

Is there a special association between self judgements and conscious recollection?

Dual‐process models of recognition memory posit a rapid retrieval process that produces a general sense of familiarity and a slower retrieval process that produces conscious recollections of prior experience. The Remember–Know paradigm has been used to study the subjective correlates of these two processes with Remember judgements assumed to index conscious recollection and Know judgements assumed to index familiarity. In this paper we examine Conway and Dewhurst's recent finding that judgements of self during encoding produce more Remember responses than alternative semantic judgements. While one might interpret this result to suggest a special association between self judgement and conscious recollection, we consider the possibility that it occurs because of greater discriminability in this condition. The results of four experiments demonstrate that a self judgement condition produces more, fewer, or an equal number of Remember responses relative to a control condition depending on whether overall discriminability in the self judgement condition is greater than, less than, or equal to that in the control condition. The implications of these results for conceptions of self judgement and the use of the Remember–Know paradigm are detailed. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Identity recognition and happy and sad facial expression recall: influence of depressive symptoms

Relatively few studies have examined memory bias for social stimuli in depression or dysphoria. The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of depressive symptoms on memory for facial information. A total of 234 participants completed the Beck Depression Inventory II and a task examining memory for facial identity and expression of happy and sad faces. For both facial identity and expression, the recollective experience was measured with the Remember/Know/Guess procedure (Gardiner & Richardson-Klavehn, 2000). The results show no major association between depressive symptoms and memory for identities. However, dysphoric individuals consciously recalled (Remember responses) more sad facial expressions than non-dysphoric individuals. These findings suggest that sad facial expressions led to more elaborate encoding, and thereby better recollection, in dysphoric individuals.     

Identity recognition and happy and sad facial expression recall: Influence of depressive symptoms

Relatively few studies have examined memory bias for social stimuli in depression or dysphoria. The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of depressive symptoms on memory for facial information. A total of 234 participants completed the Beck Depression Inventory II and a task examining memory for facial identity and expression of happy and sad faces. For both facial identity and expression, the recollective experience was measured with the Remember/Know/Guess procedure (Gardiner & Richardson-Klavehn, 2000). The results show no major association between depressive symptoms and memory for identities. However, dysphoric individuals consciously recalled (Remember responses) more sad facial expressions than non-dysphoric individuals. These findings suggest that sad facial expressions led to more elaborate encoding, and thereby better recollection, in dysphoric individuals.     

Autonoetic consciousness in autobiographical memories after medial temporal lobe resection

This study aims to investigate autonoetic consciousness associated with episodic autobiographical memory in patients who had undergone unilateral medial temporal lobe resection for intractable epilepsy. Autonoetic consciousness, defined as the conscious feeling of mentally travelling back in time to relive a specific event, was assessed using the Remember/Know (R/K) paradigm across different time periods as proposed in the autobiographical memory task developed by Piolino et al. (TEMPau task). Results revealed that the two patient groups (left and right temporal resection) gave reduced sense of reliving (R) responses and more familiarity (K) responses than healthy controls. This poor autonoetic consciousness was highlighted when patients were asked to justify their Remember responses by recalling sensory-perceptive, affective or spatiotemporal specific details across all life periods. These results support the bilateral MTL contribution to episodic autobiographical memory covering the entire lifespan, which is consistent with the multiple trace theory of MTL function. This study also demonstrates the bilateral involvement of MTL structures in recalling specific details of personal events characterized by autonoetic consciousness.     

Facial expressions of emotion influence memory for facial identity in an automatic way

Previous studies indicate that the encoding of new facial identities in memory is influenced by the type of expression displayed by the faces. In the current study, the authors investigated whether or not this influence requires attention to be explicitly directed toward the affective meaning of facial expressions. In a first experiment, the authors found that facial identity was better recognized when the faces were initially encountered with a happy rather than an angry expression, even when attention was oriented toward facial features other than expression. Using the Remember/Know/Guess paradigm in a second experiment, the authors found that the influence of facial expressions on the conscious recollection of facial identity was even more pronounced when participants' attention was not directed toward expressions. It is suggested that the affective meaning of facial expressions automatically modulates the encoding of facial identity in memory.     

Embodiment effects in memory for facial identity and facial expression

Research suggests that states of the body, such as postures, facial expressions, and arm movements, play central roles in social information processing. This study investigated the effects of approach/avoidance movements on memory for facial information. Faces displaying a happy or a sad expression were presented and participants were induced to perform either an approach (arm flexion) or an avoidance (arm extension) movement. States of awareness associated with memory for facial identity and memory for facial expression were then assessed with the Remember/Know/Guess paradigm. The results showed that performing avoidance movements increased Know responses for the identity, and Know/Guess responses for the expression, of valence-compatible stimuli (i.e., sad faces as compared to happy faces), whereas this was not the case for approach movements. Based on these findings, it is suggested that approach/avoidance motor actions influence memory encoding by increasing the ease of processing for valence-compatible information.     

Do school-age children remember or know the personal past?

The aim of this study was to examine developmental differences in autobiographical memory using a novel test that assesses its semantic and episodic subcomponents. Forty-two children aged 7-13 years were asked to recall semantic information and episodic events from three different time periods (current school year, last school year, and previous school years). For the recalls of all events, sense of remembering or sense of just knowing was measured via the Remember/Know paradigm. Age-related differences were observed for episodic autobiographical memory whereas semantic autobiographical memory was characterized by a relative developmental invariance. The increase with age was also found in the number of "Remember" responses and their justification in terms of the actual contextual information retrieved-factual, spatial, and, more especially, temporal details. These findings highlight developmental differences between the episodic and semantic subcomponents of autobiographical memory and support the view that mental 'time travel' through subjective time, which allows one to re-experience the past through self-awareness, is the last feature of autobiographical memory to become fully operational.     

Mediators of age-related differences in recollective experience in recognition memory

This study examined states of awareness with the Remember/Know paradigm during verbal recognition memory in young and old adults. Following the presentation of a word list, subjects undertook a recognition test and indicated whether they could consciously recollect its prior occurrence (R) or recognize it on some other basis, without conscious recollection (K). In this individual-difference approach we also incorporated various processing-speed and working-memory measures to study the link between aging, states of awareness and processing resources. The results revealed that, compared to younger adults, older adults exhibited a decline in the amount of R responses during the recognition test whereas the amount of K responses did not change. Structural equation modeling indicated that a slower processing speed associated with a limited working-memory capacity is a key to explaining age-related variance in conscious recollection. The findings offer further support for the distinction between remembering and knowing and for the processing-resources hypothesis of aging.     

The contribution of recollection and familiarity to recognition memory performance in chronic pain patients

This study examines the selective impact of chronic pain on memory functioning in a recognition task. Thirty chronic pain patients and 30 healthy control subjects performed a yes-no word recognition test. The contribution of recollection and familiarity to both groups' performance was compared by means of the Remember/Know (R/K) procedure, which distinguishes recognition based on the recollection of the encoding episode (R responses) and recognition accompanied by a feeling of familiarity (K responses). Chronic pain patients showed a decrease in recollection together with an increase in familiarity: indeed, they reported less R and more K responses than control subjects. This pattern of performance was not related to the overall recognition ability. These findings are consistent with the hypothesis of the attentional cost of chronic pain, suggesting a selective impact of chronic pain on the most attention-demanding cognitive processes, such as recollection. This study emphasises the relevance of specific procedures distinguishing the underlying components of memory functioning rather than solely global indicators.     

Remembering and Knowing: Using another’s subjective report to make inferences about memory strength and subjective experience

The Remember–Know paradigm is commonly used to examine experiential states during recognition. In this paradigm, whether a Know response is defined as a high-confidence state of certainty or a low-confidence state based on familiarity varies across researchers, and differences in definitions and instructions have been shown to influence participants’ responding. Using a novel approach, in three internet-based questionnaires participants were placed in the role of ‘memory expert’ and classified others’ justifications of recognition decisions. Results demonstrated that participants reliably differentiated between others’ memory experiences – both in terms of confidence and other inherent differences in the justifications. Furthermore, under certain conditions, manipulations of confidence were found to shift how items were assigned to subjective experience categories (Remember, Know, Familiar, and Guess). Findings are discussed in relation to the relationship between subjective experience and confidence, and the separation of Know and Familiar response categories within the Remember–Know paradigm.     

Bias in self-motion perceived speed can enhance episodic memory

Prior experiences of a stimulus facilitate reprocessing of that stimulus on a subsequent occasion. This relative ease and speed with which information is processed is defined as fluency and can constitute a basis for memory judgment. Fluency can also be manipulated on line by perceptual bias (e.g., levels of noise), leading to an increase in recognition for items processed more fluently (e.g., items with less noise). Previous experiments using Remember–Know paradigm have shown an impact of perceptual fluency only on familiarity and not on recollection. Recent episodic memory models have postulated a strong link between episodic memory and spatial processes, especially with egocentric updating (Gomez et al. in Acta Psychol 132(3):221–227, 2009). The present experiment was conducted to determine whether self-motion fluency affects recognition performance and particularly has an impact on “Remember” responses. Thirty participants learned a 4-min path movie and then had to recognize among short paths if they were part of the learned path, followed by a Remember–Know procedure for recognized items. Self-motion fluency was manipulated with the presence of nimble acceleration applied on a small part of the recognition paths. Results show that the presence of a self-motion fluency increases significantly the proportion of remember responses solely on learned paths. This study spotlights for the first time a specific fluency effect on recollection and indicates an implication of egocentric-updating processing in episodic memory retrieval.     

The assessment of recognition memory using the Remember/Know procedure in amnestic mild cognitive impairment and probable Alzheimer’s disease

This study used the Remember/Know (R/K) procedure combined with signal detection analyses to assess recognition memory in 20 elders with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI), 10 patients with probable Alzheimer’s disease (AD) as well as matched healthy older adults. Signal detection analyses first indicated that aMCI and control participants were comparable on general recognition performance. As regards AD patients, they were impaired relative to both aMCI and healthy elders. When assessing Remember and Know responses the aMCI group showed diminished sensitivity for Remember responses but intact Know responses compared to healthy elders. In contrast, AD patients showed decreased sensitivity for both Remember and Know responses compared to control and aMCI participants. The response bias index revealed that AD patients were more liberal than aMCI and control participants when providing Know responses. On the other measures, response bias was comparable between the groups. Overall, this study indicates that the R/K procedure can characterize different aspects of recognition memory performance in persons with aMCI or AD.     

False memories for a robbery in young and older adults

The aim of the present study was to analyse memory performance in young and older adults based on a robbery scenario. The study examined free recall and the recognition of actions, people and details, as well as the Remember/Know/Guess judgements that accompanied recognition. Recognition was evaluated both immediately and 1 week later, although performance was not affected by the retention interval. In the free recall task, the older adults remembered less information than the younger adults but we found no differences between the two with regard to errors. Participants accepted more false actions, thus achieving higher recognition accuracy for people and details. They also categorized false alarms for actions more often as remember than as know or guess judgements. This pattern of results was more pronounced in the older adults, suggesting that aging is an important factor in false memories for events. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Interfering with remembering and knowing: effects of divided attention at retrieval

A Remember-Know paradigm was used to examine the cognitive resource requirements of recollection and familiarity memory processes at retrieval. Younger and older adults studied a list of words, and in a later auditory recognition test indicated whether each word was Remembered, Known, or New. Retrieval was performed under full or divided attention (DA) conditions, with either a digit task to numbers, or an animacy task to words, presented visually. Younger and older adults showed an increase in false Remember responses during both DA conditions, indicating a general effect of attention on illusory recollection. Both age groups also showed decreased accuracy in Know responses, but only during the word-based DA condition, indicating a material-specific effect on familiarity. Aging was associated with decreased accuracy in Remember, but not Know, responses, and with increased latency in distracting task responses under DA conditions. Results suggest that avoiding false recollective responses during retrieval requires attentional resources, whereas accurate familiarity responses require the reactivation of content-specific representations.     

Subjective qualities of memories associated with the picture superiority effect in schizophrenia

Patients with schizophrenia (n = 24) matched with 24 normal subjects were presented with both words and pictures. On a recognition memory task, they were asked to give remember, know, or guess responses to items that were recognized on the basis of conscious recollection, familiarity, or guessing, respectively. Compared with normal subjects, patients exhibited a lower picture superiority effect selectively related to remember responses. Unlike normal subjects, they did not exhibit any word superiority effect in relation to guess responses; this explains why the overall picture superiority effect appeared to be intact. These results emphasize the need to take into account the subjective states of awareness when analyzing memory impairments in schizophrenia.     

In what sense is implicit memory "episodic"? The effect of reinstating environmental context

We consider three aspects of the term episodic. Previous literature shows implicit memory does not make conscious autobiographical reference but does code an item's intrinsic context (e.g., perceptual detail). Here, we consider extrinsic context--namely, that not directly processed as part of item identification and not overtly relevant to the task. Study-test mismatch in environmental context (outdoors vs. indoors) reduced memory in an explicit stem-cued recall task but had no effect on repetition priming in an implicit stem completion task. This was true even for very low frequency words. We support the view that implicit memory reflects traces within perceptual (or semantic) knowledge-based systems that are instance specific but do not code the full spatiotemporal context information necessary to support conscious recollection. We also interpret our results as consistent with differences in environmental context specificity between free recall and recognition.     

Is associative recognition more impaired than item recognition memory in Schizophrenia? A meta-analysis

Item recognition memory judgment can be based on two processes: item familiarity and/or the conscious recollection of the initial event. On the other hand, associative recognition relies preferably on conscious recollection. Since evidence points to a specific deficit of conscious recollection in schizophrenia, these patients could show greater impairment during associative recognition tasks relative to item recognition tasks. A meta-analysis of 23 studies of recognition memory in schizophrenia was conducted to test this hypothesis. The impairment is indeed 20% greater (p=0.04) for associative recognition relative to item recognition. This study supports the hypothesis of a specific conscious recollection deficit underlying episodic memory impairment in schizophrenia.     

Overgeneral autobiographical memory recollection in Iranian combat veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder

This study examined the recollection of autobiographical material in memory among Iranian military veterans with and without posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and healthy non-trauma-exposed control subjects. Participants completed the Autobiographical Memory Test, Autobiographical Memory Interview (counterbalanced), Impact of Event Scale-Revised, Beck Depression Inventory-II, Wechsler Memory Scale-III and Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised. The PTSD group generated fewer specific episodic and semantic details of autobiographical memory compared to the non-PTSD and control groups. Working memory did not significantly moderate the relationship between PTSD diagnosis and reduced autobiographical memory specificity but did moderate the relationship between PTSD diagnosis and semantic recall; semantic memory recall was not significantly related to working memory ability for those with PTSD but was related to working memory ability for trauma survivors without PTSD. While the data provide some support for the expectation that higher working memory ability is associated with an increased ability to retrieve specific memories (i.e. semantic memory recall in those without PTSD), the findings are also consistent with the view that for those with PTSD the demands on working memory required for affect regulation cancel out this influence of working memory in augmenting access to specific memories.