Abstract
In the present research, we produce a coherent account of the storage and retrieval processes in short- and long-term event memory, and long-term knowledge, that produce response accuracy and response time in a wide variety of conditions in our studies of recognition memory. Two to nine pictures are studied sequentially followed by a target or foil test picture in four conditions used in Nosofsky et al. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 47, 316–342, (2021) and in our new paradigm: VM: target and foil responses to a given stimulus change from trial to trial; CM: the responses do not change from trial to trial; AN: every trial uses new stimuli; MIXED: combinations of VM, CN, and AN occur on each trial. In the new paradigm a given picture is equally often tested as old or new, but only in CM is the response key the same and learnable. Our model has components that have appeared in a variety of prior accounts, including learning and familiarity, but are given support by our demonstration that accuracy and response time data from a large variety of conditions can be predicted by these processes acting together, with parameter values that largely are unchanged. A longer version of this article, containing information not found here due to space, is available online https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/h8msp.
The avalibility of the data (supplement materials), info and link is attached at the end section (https://psyarxiv.com/h8msp.).
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Data Availability
Data can be downloaded from the Open Science Framework (OSF) at https://osf.io/jp7b3/.
Code Availability
The Julia program scripts used for modeling and the Matlab program scripts for creating experiments are available for download on OSF at https://osf.io/jp7b3/.
Notes
In response to requests from a reviewer and editor, the present data were analyzed using the 2021 criteria, but median RTs became very irregular and noisy. The present data were then analyzed with criteria of 180 and 2,000; this dropped the excluded data from about 16% to 6%; this shift changed accuracy imperceptibly and caused median RT to become slightly more noisy but without changing any of the trends. The original chosen criteria are used for the present data because they were chosen in advance and hence are unbiased.
An Appendix in the archived report gives the values and number of observations for every condition, and for correct response times of the average of the medians, and their standard deviation, across the participants. That appendix also gives the model predictions for each point.
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Lai, S.L., Cao, R. & Shiffrin, R.M. Recognition memory decisions made with short- and long-term retrieval. Mem Cogn (2024). https://doi.org/10.3758/s13421-024-01518-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/s13421-024-01518-7