Reinstating effortful encoding operations at test enhances episodic remembering

Two experiments investigated the effects of reinstating encoding operations on remember and know responses in recognition memory. Experiment 1 showed that reinstating an effortful encoding task (generating words from fragments) increased remember responses at test but reinstating an automatic encoding task (reading intact words) did not. This pattern was confirmed in Experiment 2 in which words were either read intact or generated from anagrams. These findings show that repeating effortful (but not automatic) encoding operations at test cues not only the recognition of the information that was acquired via those operations but also the conscious recollection of the encoding episode.     

Category length produces an inverted-U discriminability function in episodic recognition memory

Four experiments used signal detection analyses to assess recognition memory for lists of words consisting of differing numbers of exemplars from different semantic categories. The results showed that recognition memory performance, measured by d _a , (a) increased as category length (CL, the number of study-list items selected from the same semantic category) increased from 1 to 8 but then decreased as CL further increased from 8 to 14, (b) was greater when 2 studied items from the same category occurred back to back, rather than being separated by 5–11 items from other categories, and (c) was greater for the first studied 2 exemplars than for the last studied 2 exemplars from blocked categories with CLs of 8 or 14. For all CLs, all z-coordinate receiver operating characteristic (z-ROC) functions were linear with slopes significantly less than 1.0, and none had a significant quadratic component. These results pose a challenge for three major classes of recognition memory models: item-noise, context-noise, and dual-process models.     

Prior probabilities and representational momentum

In many previous experiments on representational momentum (in which memory for the final location of a moving target is displaced in the direction of target motion), participants judged whether a probe presented after a target vanished was at the same location where that target vanished or at a different location. The experiments reported here manipulated the actual or expected prior probability a same response to such a probe would be correct. In Experiment 1, a same response was correct on 10%, 30%, 50%, 70%, or 90% of the trials, but observers were not instructed regarding these probabilities. In Experiment 2, a same response was correct on 11% of the trials, but different groups of participants were instructed that a same response would be correct on 10%, 30%, 50%, 70%, or 90% of the trials. Probabilities of a same response to different probe positions, weighted mean estimates of representational momentum, hit rates and false alarm rates, and d′ and ß are reported. Representational momentum occurred in all conditions but was not influenced by actual or expected prior probability a same response would be correct. The data suggest representational momentum does not result from changes in sensitivity, and a distinction between performance bias and competence bias is introduced.     

Developing ways to encourage early detection and presentation of oral cancer: What do high-risk individuals think?

The aim of this pilot research was to improve understanding of individuals at risk of oral cancer, to determine their attitudes towards and responses to early detection interventions. In-depth interviews with the target group (n?=?25) were used to determine their views, attitudes and requirements for an intervention to encourage early detection of oral cancer. This data was used in combination with theory-based constructs to develop written material that aimed to increase awareness of oral cancer, encourage mouth self-examination (MSE) and early presentation. A second pilot study used a think-aloud protocol to assess the target groups’ (n?=?14) reactions to the written information. In both studies the tape-recorded responses were analysed using framework analysis. The target group had limited knowledge about oral cancer, particularly the signs and symptoms. Participants saw benefits in performing MSE but noted the main barriers were not knowing what signs to look for or where to look. The written information was generally well-received but required some modifications. In particular, the target group required further persuasion that their lifestyle contributed to an increased risk of oral cancer. The results of these pilot studies have informed the development of a theory-based intervention for the early detection of oral cancer.     

An Intelligence Survey of a Typical Town School

In this study, the authors investigated the relation between early social contingency experiences and infants' competencies to detect nonsocial contingencies. In this study of 87 three-month-old infants, the authors operationalized early social contingencies as prompt, contingent maternal responses and coded microanalytically on the basis of video-recorded mother-infant interactions. The authors assessed competence to detect nonsocial contingencies by 2 methods: (a) the mobile conjugate reinforcement paradigm, which focuses on detecting contingencies between the infants' actions (kicking) and nonsocial consequences (mobile moving) and (b) the visual expectation paradigm, which focuses on detecting contingencies between 1 event (a smiley face projected on a screen) that was followed by a 2nd event (a complex picture projected on the other side of the screen). The results showed that early social contingencies are related to the competency to detect nonsocial action-consequence contingencies in the mobile conjugate reinforcement paradigm.     

Cutaneous Pattern Perception on Foreheads in 3- and 4-Year-Old Children

In the present study, we investigated how 3- and 4-year-old children perceived mirror-image stimuli traced on their foreheads. First, the subjects were taught matching-to-sample tasks with symmetrically shaped and asymmetrically shaped figures (called mirror-image stimuli) on cards. Then the subjects were taught cutaneous perception of a figure traced by the experimenter's finger on the forehead. Last, the subjects were tested with mirror-image stimuli in cutaneous perception tasks. The results of these experiments indicated that the subjects who could discriminate the mirror-image stimuli could also perceive asymmetrical stimuli as mirror reversals.     

Thresholds for detection and awareness of masked facial stimuli

It has been suggested that perception without awareness can be demonstrated by a dissociation between performance in objective (forced-choice) and subjective (yes–no) tasks, and such dissociations have been reported both for simple stimuli and more complex ones including faces. However, signal detection theory (SDT) indicates that the subjective measures used to assess awareness in such studies can be affected by response bias, which could account for the observed dissociation, and this was confirmed by Balsdon and Azzopardi (2015) using simple visual targets. However, this finding may not apply to all types of stimulus, as the detectability of complex targets such as faces is known to be affected by their configuration as well as by their stimulus energy. We tested this with a comparison of forced-choice and yes–no detection of facial stimuli depicting happy or angry or fearful expressions using a backward masking paradigm, and using SDT methods including correcting for unequal variances in the underlying signal distributions, to measure sensitivity independently of response criterion in 12 normal observers. In 47 out 48 comparisons there was no significant difference between sensitivity (d_a) in the two tasks: hence, across the range of expressions tested it appears that the configuration of complex stimuli does not enhance detectability independently of awareness. The results imply that, on the basis of psychophysical experiments in normal observers, there is no reason to postulate that performance and awareness are mediated by separate processes.     

Catching the liar as a matter of justice: Effects of belief in a just world on deception detection accuracy and the moderating role of mortality salience

Belief in a just world has been linked to high interpersonal trust and less suspicion of deception. We therefore predicted people with a strong dispositional belief in a just world to have low motivation to accurately detect deception. Accordingly, we hypothesized such a belief to be negatively related to accuracy in deception detection. Furthermore, research on Terror Management Theory has indicated that culturally shared values, such as justice, become more important after mortality salience. Thus, we assumed engaging in justice concerns after a death threat is especially relevant for people with a strong belief in a just world, and further, that accurate deception detection is a matter of justice. Based on this reasoning, we expected people with a strong belief in a just world to have an increased motivation to accurately detect deception after mortality salience. Consequently, we hypothesized dispositional differences in belief in a just world to be unrelated to accuracy in deception detection after mortality salience. In line with these predictions, our study revealed that participants with a strong (vs. weak) belief in a just world were worse in deception detection unless they had first been reminded of their mortality.     

Using forced choice to test belief bias in syllogistic reasoning

In deductive reasoning, believable conclusions are more likely to be accepted regardless of their validity. Although many theories argue that this belief bias reflects a change in the quality of reasoning, distinguishing qualitative changes from simple response biases can be difficult (Dube, Rotello, & Heit, 2010). We introduced a novel procedure that controls for response bias. In Experiments 1 and 2, the task required judging which of two simultaneously presented syllogisms was valid. Surprisingly, there was no evidence for belief bias with this forced choice procedure. In Experiment 3, the procedure was modified so that only one set of premises was viewable at a time. An effect of beliefs emerged: unbelievable conclusions were judged more accurately, supporting the claim that beliefs affect the quality of reasoning. Experiments 4 and 5 replicated and extended this finding, showing that the effect was mediated by individual differences in cognitive ability and analytic cognitive style. Although the positive findings of Experiments 3–5 are most relevant to the debate about the mechanisms underlying belief bias, the null findings of Experiments 1 and 2 offer insight into how the presentation of an argument influences the manner in which people reason.     

Infants detect changes in everyday scenes: The role of scene gist

When watching physical events, infants bring to bear prior knowledge about objects and readily detect changes that contradict physical rules. Here we investigate the possibility that scene gist may affect infants, as it affects adults, when detecting changes in everyday scenes. In Experiment 1, 15-month-old infants missed a perceptually salient change that preserved the gist of a generic outdoor scene; the same change was readily detected if infants had insufficient time to process the display and had to rely on perceptual information for change detection. In Experiment 2, 15-month-olds detected a perceptually subtle change that preserved the scene gist but violated the rule of object continuity, suggesting that physical rules may overpower scene gist in infants’ change detection. Finally, Experiments 3 and 4 provided converging evidence for the effects of scene gist, showing that 15-month-olds missed a perceptually salient change that preserved the gist and detected a perceptually subtle change that disrupted the gist. Together, these results suggest that prior knowledge, including scene knowledge and physical knowledge, affects the process by which infants maintain their representations of everyday scenes.