Memory & Cognition

Vitevitch, Michael; Sommers, Mitchell

doi: 10.3758/BF03196091pmid: 12872866

A tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) elicitation task and a picture-naming task were used to examine the role of neighborhood frequency as well as word frequency and neighborhood density in speech production. As predicted for the younger adults in Experiment 1, more TOT states were elicited for words with low word frequency and with sparse neighborhoods. Contrary to predictions, neighborhood frequency did not significantly influence retrieval of the target word. For the older adults in Experiment 2, however, more TOT states were elicited for words with low neighborhood frequency. Furthermore, in Experiment 3, pictures with high neighborhood frequency were named more quickly and accurately than pictures with low neighborhood frequency. These results show that the number of neighbors and the frequency of those neighbors influence lexical retrieval in speech production. The facilitative nature of these factors is more parsimoniously accounted for by an interactive model rather than by a strictly feedforward model of speech production.

Locker, Lawrence; Simpson, Greg; Yates, Mark

doi: 10.3758/BF03196092pmid: 12872867

The effect of semantic neighborhood on the processing of ambiguous words was examined in two lexical decision experiments. Semantic neighborhood was defined in terms of semantic set size and network connectivity. In Experiment 1, the variables of semantic set size, network connectivity, and ambiguity were crossed. An ambiguity advantage was observed only within small-set low-connectivity words. In Experiment 2, the effect of network connectivity on the processing of words of high and low meaning relatedness was examined. Participants responded more rapidly to words of high meaning relatedness, relative to words of low meaning relatedness, but only within high-connectivity words. These results are interpreted within a framework in which both semantic feedback processes and meaninglevel competition can affect the recognition of semantically ambiguous words.

Smith-Chant, Brenda; LeFevre, Jo-Anne

doi: 10.3758/BF03196093pmid: 12872868

Adults (n = 64) solved single-digit multiplication problems under both speed and accuracy instructions. Half also provided self-reports of their solutions to the problems. The participants with relatively low levels of arithmetic fluency were most influenced by instructional requirements. They responded more slowly and accurately when asked to provide descriptions of their solution procedures, whereas the performance of the participants with high and average levels of arithmetic fluency did not change. Furthermore, the performance of the low-fluency participants was more affected by speed and accuracy demands than was that of the other individuals, but only when the low-fluency participants were also required to provide self-reports. Accordingly, models of mental arithmetic will need to include roles for individual differences and situational factors.

Ischebeck, Anja

doi: 10.3758/BF03196094pmid: 12872869

Numbers can be represented as number words or as digits, but are the two notations processed differently? Two experiments in which a flanker paradigm with a naming task was used were conducted, with digits and number words as targets and flankers. Reaction times were shortest when the flanker denoted the same numerical value as the target. The numerical distance between the target and a numerically different flanker modulated reaction times in all conditions, except for number word targets with digit flankers. The direction of this effect—targets were named faster when the flanker was numerically close than when it was far—indicates that the numerical magnitude representations of numbers are associatively connected. When the target and the flanker were presented in the same format, no difference was observed in the distance effects for the two formats. This indicates that number words activate the abstract representation of their numerical value in a way that is very similar to that for digits.

Pilling, Michael; Wiggett, Alison; Özgen, Emre; Davies, Ian

doi: 10.3758/BF03196095pmid: 12872870

Roberson and Davidoff (2000) found that colorcategorical perception (CP; better cross-category than within-category discrimination) was eliminated by verbal, but not by visual, interference presented during the interstimulus interval (ISI) of a discrimination task. On the basis of this finding, Roberson and Davidoff concluded that CP was mediated by verbal labels, and not by perceptual mechanisms, as is generally assumed. Experiment 1 replicated their results. However, it was found that if the interference type was uncertain on each trial (Experiment 2), CP then survived verbal interference. Moreover, it was found that the target color name could be retained across the ISI even with verbal interference (Experiment 3). We therefore conclude that color CP may indeed involve verbal labeling but that verbal interference does not necessarily prevent it.

Conrad, Frederick; Brown, Norman; DASHEN, Monica

doi: 10.3758/BF03196096pmid: 12872871

We report two experiments about how people estimate the frequency of event properties when they are explicitly (e.g.,spinach—GREEN) and implicitly (e.g.,spinach) presented. In Experiment 1, verbal reports indicated that, for explicitly presented properties, participants used several retrieval- and impressionbased strategies and were relatively accurate. Implicitly presented properties led tooff-target retrieval, which brought to mind more instances of nontarget than of target properties and degraded estimates. A third group estimated the frequency of taxonomic categories (e.g.,furniture) much as the explicit property group did, suggesting that people can use properties to organize remembered events. In a second experiment, estimation time patterns underscored the results of Experiment 1 and eliminated reactive verbal reports as an explanation. Off-target retrieval was both ineffective and slow.

Oberauer, Klaus; Wendland, Mirko; Kliegl, Reinhold

doi: 10.3758/BF03196097pmid: 12872872

Twenty-four young (23 years) and 24 old (71 years) adults performed arithmetic tasks with working memory loads ranging from 1 to 4. Age groups were equivalent in mean accuracy and speed of arithmetic operations under minimal working memory load, but old adults were slower than young with memory demands >1. Access to a new object in working memory as the basis of computation required additional time. This object-switching cost increased with increases in memory demand, but was unaffected by age, indicating that old adults have no deficit in selective access to working memory.

Perfect, Timothy; Harris, Lucy

doi: 10.3758/BF03196098pmid: 12872873

Eyewitnesses are known often to falsely identify a familiar but innocent bystander when asked to pick out a perpetrator from a lineup. Such unconscious transference errors have been attributed to either identity confusions at encoding or source retrieval errors. Three experiments contrasted younger and older adults in their susceptibility to such misidentifications. Participants saw photographs of perpetrators, then a series of mug shots of innocent bystanders. A week later, they saw lineups containing bystanders (and others containing perpetrators in Experiment 3) and were asked whether any of the perpetrators were present. When younger faces were used as stimuli (Experiments 1 and 3), older adults showed higher rates of transference errors. When older faces were used as stimuli (Experiments 2 and 3), no such age effects in rates of unconscious transference were apparent. In addition, older adults in Experiment 3 showed an own-age bias effect for correct identification of targets. Unconscious transference errors were found to be due to both source retrieval errors and identity confusions, but age-related increases were found only in the latter.

Neys, Wim; Schaeken, Walter; D’Ydewalle, Géry

doi: 10.3758/BF03196099pmid: 12872874

Reasoning with conditionals involving causal content is known to be affected by retrieval of counterexamples from semantic memory. In this study we examined the characteristics of this search process in everyday conditional reasoning. In Experiment 1 we manipulated the number (zero to four) of explicitly presented counterexamples (alternative causes or disabling conditions) for causal conditionals. In Experiment 2, using a generation pretest, we measured the number of counterexamples participants could retrieve for a set of causal conditionals. One month after the pretest, participants were presented a reasoning task with the same conditionals. The experiments indicated that acceptance of modus ponens linearly decreased with every additionally retrieved disabler, whereas affirmation of the consequent acceptance linearly decreased as a function of the number of retrieved alternatives. Results for denial of the antecedent and modus tollens were less clear. The findings show that the search process does not necessarily stop after retrieval of a single counterexample and that every additional counterexample has an impact on the inference acceptance.

Tubau, Elisabet; Alonso, Diego

doi: 10.3758/BF03196100pmid: 12872875

In the context of conditional probabilities, a good example of the marked discrepancy between intuition and formal reasoning is the Monty Hall dilemma (MHD). We used the MHD to study the effects of practicing the game, making explicit the underlying structure, or enhancing the representation of the different possibilities, on reaching and stating the correct answer. The results of the experiments showed that accumulated experience with the MHD increased the proportion of switching responses but did not change erroneous intuitions (Experiment 1). However, when the dilemma was presented in the form of an adversary game that made the underlying structure more explicit, more participants formed complete mental representations that enabled them to reason correctly (Experiment 2). This result was observed even without any practice with the game if the participants were encouraged to represent possibilities (Experiment 3). Therefore, in this context, correct reasoning seems to depend more on the ability to consider different possibilities than on extensive practice with the game.