Using warnings to reduce categorical false memories in younger and older adults

Closing the door to false memory: the effects of levels-of-processing and stimulus type on the rejection of perceptually vs. semantically dissimilar distractors

False recognition memory for nonstudied items that share features with targets can be reduced by retrieval monitoring mechanisms. The recall-to-reject process, for example, involves the recollection of information about studied items that disqualifies inconsistent test probes. Monitoring for specific features during retrieval may be enhanced by an encoding orientation that is recapitulated during retrieval. In two experiments, we used concrete words or door scenes as materials and manipulated the level of processing at study and the type of distractors presented at test. We showed that for the verbal material, semantic level of processing at study results in an effective rejection of semantically inconsistent distractors. However, for the pictorial material, the perceptual level of processing leads to an effective rejection of perceptually inconsistent distractors. For targets, the effect of levels of processing was observed for words but not for pictures. The results suggest that retrieval monitoring mechanisms depend on interactions between encoding orientation, study materials, and differentiating features of distractors.

How does social competition affect true and false recognition?

Memory is highly susceptible to distortions, which can exert serious consequences in daily life. Despite this, we still know little about the role of factors that comprise social contexts in which memory processes occur. In the present study, we attempted to address this issue by examining how social competition influences true and false recognition. Participants performed a version of the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm designed to lure them into producing both true and false recognition either in competition against or independently of another person. We found that participants in the competition group showed lower levels of true and false recognition than those in the control group. Signal-detection analyses revealed that participants in both groups showed equivalent memory sensitivity for true recognition, while those in the competition group exhibited a decreased sensitivity for false recognition, which implies enhanced item-specific encoding during social competition. Moreover, participants in the competition group showed a more conservative response bias for both true and false recognition at retrieval than those in the control group, indicating a shift towards conservatism in decision strategy for both true and false recognition during social competition. The results provide compelling evidence for a decision-based reduction of true recognition and both encoding-based and decision-based reductions of false recognition under competitive contexts. Therefore, these novel findings may have implications both for understanding the powerful role of social competition on true and false memories and for understanding the potential role of social competition on other aspects of memory processes.

Cultural differences in categorical memory errors persist with age

OBJECTIVES

This cross-sectional experiment examined the influence of aging on cross-cultural differences in memory errors. Previous research revealed that Americans committed more categorical memory errors than Turks; we tested whether the cognitive constraints associated with aging impacted the pattern of memory errors across cultures. Furthermore, older adults are vulnerable to memory errors for semantically-related information, and we assessed whether this tendency occurs across cultures.

METHODS

Younger and older adults from the US and Turkey studied word pairs, with some pairs sharing a categorical relationship and some unrelated. Participants then completed a cued recall test, generating the word that was paired with the first. These responses were scored for correct responses or different types of errors, including categorical and semantic.

RESULTS

The tendency for Americans to commit more categorical memory errors emerged for both younger and older adults. In addition, older adults across cultures committed more memory errors, and these were for semantically-related information (including both categorical and other types of semantic errors).

CONCLUSION

Heightened vulnerability to memory errors with age extends across cultural groups, and Americans' proneness to commit categorical memory errors occurs across ages. The findings indicate some robustness in the ways that age and culture influence memory errors.

Everyday Memory in Healthy Aging: Porous but Not Distorted

Most studies targeting age-association of memory functions report a decline in recognition hits and an increase in false alarms. The goal of the present study was to assess these findings in tasks with day-to-day relevance. We investigated healthy young (YA; age 26.90 ± 3.55 years) and old (OA; age 69.80 ± 5.85 years) adults. Participants were asked to watch six news and six commercials and complete a recognition task relating to the information presented in the videos. OA had a lower hit rate in both news and commercials compared to YA. However, the number of false alarms (FA) was the same in both age groups. Applying signal detection theory, we found age differences in discriminability for both news and commercials paradigm. The groups showed no differences in bias and both chose a liberal answering tendency. We interpret our finding as a result of complex recognition items in an ecologically valid task. Multi-feature items offer an advantage in correct rejection—it is enough to know that at least one feature of an item is false. This benefit does not extend to hits, where all features of an item need to be recognized. This indicates that recognition memory of naturalistic stimuli in OA is porous, but not distorted.

False memories with age: Neural and cognitive underpinnings

As we age we become increasingly susceptible to memory distortions and inaccuracies. Over the past decade numerous neuroimaging studies have attempted to illuminate the neural underpinnings of aging and false memory. Here we review these studies, and link their findings with those concerning the cognitive properties of age-related changes in memory accuracy. Collectively this evidence points towards a prominent role for age-related declines in medial temporal and prefrontal brain areas, and corresponding impairments in associative binding and strategic monitoring. A resulting cascade of cognitive changes contributes to the heightened vulnerability to false memories with age, including reduced recollective ability, a reliance on gist information and familiarity-based monitoring mechanisms, as well as a reduced ability to inhibit irrelevant information and erroneous binding of features between memory traces. We consider both theoretical and applied implications of research on aging and false memories, as well as questions remaining to be addressed in future research.