Abstract
While the within-S, or ipsative, galvanic skin response (GSR) categorization has led to an arousal/retention-internal interaction with superior immediate recall of low-arousal items and reminiscence of high-arousal items, a different pattern of results has been reported using a normative GSR categorization. This mode of analysis, based on mean GSRs across all Ss, has yielded superior recall for high items across all time conditions. A reanalysis of three paired-associate studies, previously published using the ipsative procedure, shows the normative pattern for the two studies involving meaningful material, but not in the case of nonsense-syllable stimulus items. It is concluded that both normative and ipsative effects can account for a significant portion of the variance in a one-trial paired-associate paradigm usifig meaningful material. In contrast to the ipsative GSR, the normative GSR appears to be related to the way meaningful items are characteristically encoded.
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This investigation was supported by Research Grant MH-11599 from the National Institutes of Mental Health, United States Public Health Service. We are very grateful to Edward Levonian of the University of California, Los Angeles, for suggesting that we analyze our original data in terms of normative arousal categories.
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Kaplan, S., Kaplan, R. The interaction of arousal and retention interval: Ipsative vs normative scoring. Psychon Sci 19, 115–117 (1970). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03337449
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03337449