The effect of semantic relatedness on immediate serial recall and serial recognition

Semantic partitioning facilitates memory for object location through category-partition cueing

In our lived environments, objects are often semantically organised (e.g., cookware and cutlery are placed close together in the kitchen). Across four experiments, we examined how semantic partitions (that group same-category objects in space) influenced memory for object locations. Participants learned the locations of items in a semantically partitioned display (where each partition contained objects from a single category) as well as a purely visually partitioned display (where each partition contained a scrambled assortment of objects from different categories). Semantic partitions significantly improved location memory accuracy compared to the scrambled display. However, when the correct partition was cued (highlighted) to participants during recall, performance on the semantically partitioned display was similar to the scrambled display. These results suggest that semantic partitions largely benefit memory for location by enhancing the ability to use the given category as a cue for a visually partitioned area (e.g., toys - top left). Our results demonstrate that semantically structured spaces help location memory across partitions, but not items within a partition, providing new insights into the interaction between meaning and memory.

Semantic relatedness can impair memory for item locations

While memory for semantically related items is improved over unrelated items in many cases, relatedness can also lead to memory costs. Here we examined how the semantic relatedness of words within a display influenced memory for their locations. Participants learned the locations of words inside grid displays; the words in a given display were either from a single category or were from different assorted categories. When a display containing words from a single category was compared to a scrambled display containing words from multiple categories, location memory performance was rendered worse, while word recall performance was significantly improved. Our results suggest that semantically structured spaces can both help and harm memory within the context of a location memory task. We hypothesize that relatedness can improve memory performance by increasing the likelihood that matching candidates will be retrieved, yet might worsen performance that requires distinguishing between similar target representations.

Semantic partitioning facilitates memory for object location through category-partition cueing

In our lived environments, objects are often semantically organised (e.g., cookware and cutlery are placed close together in the kitchen). Across four experiments, we examined how semantic partitions (that group same-category objects in space) influenced memory for object locations. Participants learned the locations of items in a semantically partitioned display (where each partition contained objects from a single category) as well as a purely visually partitioned display (where each partition contained a scrambled assortment of objects from different categories). Semantic partitions significantly improved location memory accuracy compared to the scrambled display. However, when the correct partition was cued (highlighted) to participants during recall, performance on the semantically partitioned display was similar to the scrambled display. These results suggest that semantic partitions largely benefit memory for location by enhancing the ability to use the given category as a cue for a visually partitioned area (e.g., toys - top left). Our results demonstrate that semantically structured spaces help location memory across partitions, but not items within a partition, providing new insights into the interaction between meaning and memory.

The Semantic Similarity Effect on Short-Term Memory: Null Effects of Affectively Defined Semantic Similarity

Studies on short-term memory have repeatedly demonstrated the beneficial effect of semantic similarity. Although the effect seems robust, the aspects of semantics targeted by these studies (e.g., categorical structure, associative relationship, or dimension of meaning) should be clarified. A recent meta-regression study inspired by Osgood's view, which highlights affective dimensions in semantics, introduced a novel index for quantifying semantic similarity using affective values. Building on the results of the meta-regression of past studies' data with that index, this study predicts that semantic similarity is deleterious to short-term memory if it is manipulated by affective dimensions, after controlling for other confounding factors. This prediction was directly tested. The experimental results of the immediate serial recall task (Study 1) and immediate serial reconstruction of order task (Study 2) indicated null effects of semantic similarity by affective dimensions and thus falsified the prediction. These results suggest that semantic similarity based on affective dimensions is negligible.

Verbal working memory encodes phonological and semantic information differently

Working memory (WM) is often tested through immediate serial recall of word lists. Performance in such tasks is negatively influenced by phonological similarity: People more often get the order of words wrong when they are phonologically similar to each other (e.g., cat, fat, mat). This phonological-similarity effect shows that phonology plays an important role for the representation of serial order in these tasks. By contrast, semantic similarity usually does not impact performance negatively. To resolve and understand this discrepancy, we tested the effects of phonological and semantic similarity for the retention of positional information in WM. Across six experiments (all Ns = 60 young adults), we manipulated between-item semantic and phonological similarity in tasks requiring participants to form and maintain new item-context bindings in WM. Participants were asked to retrieve items from their context, or the contexts from their item. For both retrieval directions, phonological similarity impaired WM for item-context bindings across all experiments. Semantic similarity did not. These results demonstrate that WM encodes phonological and semantic information differently. We propose a WM model accounting for semantic-similarity effects in WM, in which semantic knowledge supports WM through activated long-term memory.

Semantic Relatedness Effects in Serial Recall But Not in Serial Reconstruction of Order

Lists of semantically related words are better recalled than lists of unrelated words on immediate serial recall tests. Prominent explanations for this beneficial effect of semantic relatedness, such as the item/order hypothesis, invoke differential contributions of item and order information and predict that on tests that de-emphasize item information, the effect of semantic relatedness will be abolished. The prediction is hard to assess because previous studies using reconstruction of order tests show conflicting and equivocal results. Three experiments are reported that were designed to minimize problems associated with extant studies and that will allow reassessment of the prediction that semantic relatedness will have no effect on reconstruction of order tests. The experiments replicated the usual beneficial effect of semantic relatedness on memory when the test was serial recall but found no effect when the test was reconstruction of order. These results were observed regardless of whether semantic relatedness was defined by category membership (Experiment 1), association (Experiment 2), or meaning (Experiment 3). These results clarify earlier results in the literature and confirm a strong prediction of the item/order hypothesis.

Effects of semantic relationship and preactivation on memory updating

Semantic relationship modulates working memory (WM) processes by promoting recall but impairing recognition. Updating is a core mechanism of WM responsible for its stability and flexibility; it allows maintenance of relevant information while removing no-longer relevant one. To our knowledge, no studies specifically investigated how WM updating may benefit from the processing of semantically related material. In the current study, two experiments were run with this aim. In Experiment 1, we found an advantage for semantically related words (vs. unrelated) regardless of their association type (i.e., taxonomic or thematic). A second experiment was run boosting semantic association through preactivation. Findings replicated those of Experiment 1 suggesting that preactivation was effective and improved semantic superiority. In sum, we demonstrated that long-term semantic associations benefitted the updating process, or more generally, overall WM function. In addition, pre-activating semantic nodes of a given word appears likely a process supporting WM and updating; thus, this may be the mechanism favoring word process and memorization in a semantically related text.

The gist of it: offloading memory does not reduce the benefit of list categorisation

When we can offload to-be-remembered information to an external store, our ability to recall that information from internal memory can be diminished. However, previous research has suggested that associative memory processes may remain intact in the face of offloading behaviour. In the present investigation, we examine how the opportunity to offload memory demands affects the learning of categorised word lists. Across six experiments, participants studied and wrote down word lists that were either strongly associated with a semantic theme (categorised) or word lists that consisted of the same set of words but shuffled across the categorised lists (shuffled). When participants expected to have access to their written lists during the recall test (i.e., a condition that would encourage offloading) but were not given access to it, we found the typical recall advantage for categorised lists. This effect was found to be the same size or larger compared to a condition where participants did not expect to have access to their written lists during the recall test (i.e., a condition that would not allow offloading). We propose that gist memory supported by semantic associations is not substantially reduced in offloading.

Calculating semantic relatedness of lists of nouns using WordNet path length

Lists of semantically related words are better recalled on immediate memory tests than otherwise equivalent lists of unrelated words. However, measuring the degree of relatedness is not straightforward. We report three experiments that assess the ability of various measures of semantic relatedness-including latent semantic analysis (LSA), GloVe, fastText, and a number of measures based on WordNet-to predict whether two lists of words will be differentially recalled. In Experiment 1, all measures except LSA correctly predicted the observed better recall of the related than the unrelated list. In Experiment 2, all measures except JCN predicted that abstract words would be recalled equally as well as concrete words because of their enhanced semantic relatedness. In Experiment 3, LSA, GLoVe, and fastText predicted an enhanced concreteness effect because the concrete words were more related; three WordNet measures predicted a small concreteness effect because the abstract and concrete words did not differ in semantic relatedness; and three other WordNet measures predicted no concreteness effect because the abstract words were more related than the concrete words. A small concreteness effect was observed. Over the three experiments, only two measures, both based on simple WordNet path length, predicted all three results. We suggest that the results are not unexpected because semantic processing in episodic memory experiments differs from that in reading, similarity judgment, and analogy tasks which are the most common way of assessing such measures.

The detrimental effect of semantic similarity in short-term memory tasks: A meta-regression approach

The literature suggests that semantic similarity has a weak or null effect for immediate serial reconstruction and a facilitative effect for immediate serial recall. These observed semantic similarity effects are inconsistent with the assumptions of short-term memory (STM) models on the detrimental effect of similarity (e.g., confusion) and with observations of a robust detrimental effect of phonological similarity. Our review indicates that the experimental results are likely dependent on the manipulation strength for semantic similarity and that manipulations used in previous studies might have affected semantic assvociation as well as semantic similarity. To address these possible issues, two indices are proposed: (a) strength of manipulation on semantic similarity, gained by quantifying semantic similarity based on Osgood and associates' dimensional view of semantics, and (b) inter-item associative strength, a possible confounding factor. Our review and the results of a meta-regression analysis using these two indices suggest that semantic similarity has a detrimental effect on both serial reconstruction and serial recall, while semantic association, which is correlated with semantic similarity, contributes to an apparent facilitative effect. An effect that is not attributable to similarity or association was also implied. Review on item and order memory further suggests the facilitative effect of semantic association on item memory and the detrimental effect of the semantic similarity on order memory. Based on our findings, we propose a unified explanation of observations of semantic similarity effects for both serial reconstruction and serial recall that is in good accord with STM models.

Visual similarity effects in immediate serial recall and (sometimes) in immediate serial recognition

Words that sound dissimilar are recalled better than otherwise comparable words that sound similar on both immediate serial recall and immediate serial recognition tests, the so-called acoustic similarity effect. Although studies using immediate serial recall have shown an analogous visual similarity effect, in which words that look dissimilar are recalled better than words that look similar, this effect has not been examined in immediate serial recognition. We derived a prediction from the Feature Model that a visual similarity effect will be observed in immediate serial recognition only when the items are acoustically dissimilar; the model predicts no effect when the items are acoustically similar. Experiments 1 and 2 used visually dissimilar and visually similar stimuli that were all acoustically similar and replicated the visual similarity effect in serial recall but revealed no effect in serial recognition. Experiments 3 and 4 used a second set of stimuli that were acoustically dissimilar and found a visual similarity effect in both serial recall and serial recognition. The experiments confirm the Feature Model's predictions and add to earlier findings that the two tests, serial recall and serial recognition, may show quite different results because the two tests are not as similar as previously thought.

Testing the redintegration hypothesis by a single probe recognition paradigm

The lexicality effect in verbal short-term memory (STM), in which word lists are better recalled than nonwords lists, is considered to reflect the influence of linguistic long-term memory (LTM) knowledge on verbal STM performance. The locus of this effect remains, however, a matter of debate. The redintegrative account considers that degrading phonological traces of memoranda are reconstructed at recall by selecting lexical LTM representations that match the phonological traces. According to a strong version of this account, redintegrative processes should be strongly reduced in recognition paradigms, leading to reduced LTM effects. We tested this prediction by contrasting word and nonword memoranda in a fast encoding probe recognition paradigm. We observed a very strong lexicality effect, with better and faster recognition performance for words as compared to nonwords. These results do not support a strong version of the redintegrative account of LTM effects in STM which considers that these LTM effects would be the exclusive product of reconstruction mechanisms. If redintegration processes intervene in STM recognition tasks, they must be very fast, which at the same time provides support for models considering direct activation of lexico-semantic knowledge during verbal STM tasks.

The Role of Visual Representations within Working Memory for Paired-Associate and Serial Order of Spoken Words

Caplan and colleagues have recently explained paired-associate learning and serial-order learning with a single-mechanism computational model by assuming differential degrees of isolation. Specifically, two items in a pair can be grouped together and associated to positional codes that are somewhat isolated from the rest of the items. In contrast, the degree of isolation among the studied items is lower in serial-order learning. One of the key predictions drawn from this theory is that any variables that help chunking of two adjacent items into a group should be beneficial to paired-associate learning, more than serial-order learning. To test this idea, the role of visual representations in memory for spoken verbal materials (i.e., imagery) was compared between two types of learning directly. Experiment 1 showed stronger effects of word concreteness and of concurrent presentation of irrelevant visual stimuli (dynamic visual noise: DVN) in paired-associate memory than in serial-order memory, consistent with the prediction. Experiment 2 revealed that the irrelevant visual stimuli effect was boosted when the participants had to actively maintain the information within working memory, rather than feed it to long-term memory for subsequent recall, due to cue overloading. This indicates that the sensory input from irrelevant visual stimuli can reach and affect visual representations of verbal items within working memory, and that this disruption can be attenuated when the information within working memory can be efficiently supported by long-term memory for subsequent recall.

How language production shapes language form and comprehension

Language production processes can provide insight into how language comprehension works and language typology-why languages tend to have certain characteristics more often than others. Drawing on work in memory retrieval, motor planning, and serial order in action planning, the Production-Distribution-Comprehension (PDC) account links work in the fields of language production, typology, and comprehension: (1) faced with substantial computational burdens of planning and producing utterances, language producers implicitly follow three biases in utterance planning that promote word order choices that reduce these burdens, thereby improving production fluency. (2) These choices, repeated over many utterances and individuals, shape the distributions of utterance forms in language. The claim that language form stems in large degree from producers' attempts to mitigate utterance planning difficulty is contrasted with alternative accounts in which form is driven by language use more broadly, language acquisition processes, or producers' attempts to create language forms that are easily understood by comprehenders. (3) Language perceivers implicitly learn the statistical regularities in their linguistic input, and they use this prior experience to guide comprehension of subsequent language. In particular, they learn to predict the sequential structure of linguistic signals, based on the statistics of previously-encountered input. Thus, key aspects of comprehension behavior are tied to lexico-syntactic statistics in the language, which in turn derive from utterance planning biases promoting production of comparatively easy utterance forms over more difficult ones. This approach contrasts with classic theories in which comprehension behaviors are attributed to innate design features of the language comprehension system and associated working memory. The PDC instead links basic features of comprehension to a different source: production processes that shape language form.