Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-02-03DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01851-z
Jeffrey C Zemla, Nancy Linehan, Lynn J Lohnas
{"title":"Free recall of semantically related words reveals similarity structure.","authors":"Jeffrey C Zemla, Nancy Linehan, Lynn J Lohnas","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01851-z","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01851-z","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In free recall, semantic associations between studied items lead to clustering of those items. In prior work, the impact of these associations on recall has been assessed using measures that are independent of participant data. For example, the semantic similarity of lemon and banana can be estimated using a distributional semantic model (e.g., latent semantic analysis) and these estimates can be used to derive semantic clustering scores. We show that instead of using pre-existing estimates of semantic similarity, it is possible to estimate semantic similarity from the data itself. In one experiment, participants study categorized word lists that are either presented randomly or blocked (arranged by category). Using established and novel analyses, we find that temporal and semantic associations interact, but that semantic associations exert a predictable influence on recall order. We use this insight to develop a model for estimating pairwise similarity and a semantic network from free recall data. The estimated networks show high correspondence with both the category structure and a distributional semantic model (word2vec). Compared to word2vec, our model made more accurate predictions of clustering in free recall after controlling for temporal similarity, underscoring that similarity measures from different sources reflect different aspects of semantic information. We further validate the model using a large, pre-existing dataset (PEERS) of uncategorized free recall lists. The work presents a novel methodology that has many potential applications in the study of both episodic and semantic memory.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"1981-2001"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13461890/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146114306","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-03-14DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01871-9
Jerwen Jou
{"title":"Why is \"remember\" recognition faster than \"know\" recognition when recollection is supposed to be slower than familiarity-based recognition? A suggested explanation.","authors":"Jerwen Jou","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01871-9","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01871-9","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The dual-process theories of recognition memory postulate that recollection is slower and effortful whereas familiarity-based recognition is fast, automatic, and effortless. Although data from response-signal experiments are consistent with this dual-process position, results from experiments using the remember/know judgment paradigm are diametrically opposed to the dual-process theoretical view. That is, \"remember\"-based recognition has consistently been found to be faster than \"know\"-based recognition in the literature. Yet remember judgment is supposed to be based on recollection and know judgment based on familiarity. The present study proposed an explanation for this puzzle, which assumes that each approach bases its observation on one aspect of recognition-that is, either the contents or the strength of memory, with the dual-process approach addressing contents retrieved, and remember/know judgment the strength of memory, respectively. The conclusion is that retrieving more contents does take longer than retrieving fewer contents as posited by the dual-process theories, but that the old/new decision is faster for the stronger case with more retrieved contents (as assessed by the \"remember\" judgment) than for the weaker case with fewer retrieved contents (as assessed by the \"know\" judgment).</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2308-2325"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147460608","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-04-13DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01880-8
Karl Szpunar, Nilay Özdemir Haksever
{"title":"Toward a more positive outlook for the collective future: The role of tangible experiences and identity.","authors":"Karl Szpunar, Nilay Özdemir Haksever","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01880-8","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01880-8","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>People tend to view the collective future, and the national future in particular, in a negative light. However, recent theoretical and empirical work has suggested that tangible experiences and group identification may support a more positive collective outlook. Across two preregistered studies (N = 597), participants indicated how positive/negative they expected the future of their family and country to be in the next 10-20 years, how central their family and country were to their identity, and the extent to which they had tangible experiences with or on behalf of their country. Consistent with prior research, participants consistently viewed the future of their country in a less positive (and more negative) light than their family, although this valence-based difference was diminished for participants who identified more closely with their country than their family. Similarly, participants who reported more tangible experiences with or on behalf of their country were more positive about the national future. Mediation analyses revealed that the impact of tangible experiences on a positive national outlook was mediated by increases in identification with country. Taken together, the data indicate that tangible experiences with abstract entities (i.e., nations) may play an important role in creating a more positive outlook about the collective future. Implications for collective cognition research are discussed.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2409-2422"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147677940","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-03-30DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01877-3
Lauren K Salig, Jorge R Valdés Kroff, Jeymi Menendez, Mia C Lulli, L Robert Slevc
{"title":"¿Sabes si viene un code-switch? Bilinguals can predict upcoming code-switches given enough context.","authors":"Lauren K Salig, Jorge R Valdés Kroff, Jeymi Menendez, Mia C Lulli, L Robert Slevc","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01877-3","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01877-3","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Language comprehension involves prediction, but what exactly can comprehenders predict? We ask if bilinguals can consciously predict upcoming code-switches between languages. If predictions focus on a sentence's message, then listeners should not predict code-switches, which alter the language used but not necessarily the meaning. Alternatively, if listeners predict at many levels-including language-then they may predict code-switches. Here, we selected sentences from a corpus of spontaneous bilingual conversations that started in Spanish and removed the final word that would have continued in Spanish or code-switched to English. In two preregistered experiments, Spanish-English bilinguals heard these sentence fragments and predicted the language of the omitted final word. They successfully predicted upcoming code-switches when given 30 seconds of context prior to their predictions (Experiment 1; N = 94), but not when only hearing the sentence fragment (Experiment 2, N = 115). This shows that bilinguals can predict upcoming code-switches when sufficient conversational cues are available.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2383-2393"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13461665/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147582830","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-06-11DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01881-7
Guillermo Campoy, María D Linde, Esteban A Hidalgo, Miriam Tortajada, Lucía B Palmero, Víctor Martínez-Pérez, Luis J Fuentes
{"title":"The Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM) illusion in short-term memory: Opposite effects of retention interval on true and false recognition.","authors":"Guillermo Campoy, María D Linde, Esteban A Hidalgo, Miriam Tortajada, Lucía B Palmero, Víctor Martínez-Pérez, Luis J Fuentes","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01881-7","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01881-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>A short-term memory (STM) version of the Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm was employed to investigate how true and false recognition evolved as STM contents were lost over a short time window immediately after initial encoding. Presentations of five-word DRM lists were followed by list-specific recognition tests applied either immediately or after a distractor-filled retention interval of 3, 9, or 27 s. Results showed a decrease in the probability of true recognition and an increase in the probability of false recognition as the retention interval grew longer. Based on the fuzzy-trace theory, we suggest that this pattern emerged from the different durability of item-specific phonological representations, which would play a dual role of supporting true memory and preventing false recognition, and integrative semantic representations, whose overlap with the critical items would give rise to the DRM illusion. As a further contribution, our study helps to establish the DRM illusion in STM as a genuine and robust phenomenon by showing that it can be observed even with no delay and no intervening distraction between study and test, and that it occurs when participants are explicitly warned about the presence of semantically related distractors and instructed not to be misled by them.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2423-2435"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13461669/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148228685","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-01-26DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01852-y
Julie C Lamont, David K Bilkey
{"title":"The effect of spatial boundaries on memory in a virtual environment.","authors":"Julie C Lamont, David K Bilkey","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01852-y","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01852-y","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Crossing a spatial boundary, such as a doorway, often signals the ending of one episode and the beginning of another, segmenting ongoing experience into events. When conducted in real environments, this 'doorway effect' differentially affects memory for objects encountered within and between events. The evidence for this occurring in immersive virtual reality (VR) environments is mixed. The present study investigated the 'doorway effect' in a VR environment and also examined how event memory is affected when segmentation processes are disrupted by interference tasks. Ninety participants explored a five-room VR building containing interactable objects. During exploration, some participants were presented with virtual distractor tasks that required either visuospatial working memory or simple rapid-reaction responses. These tasks occurred either at doorways or in the middle of rooms. Later recall for the temporal order and contextual location of objects was examined and compared with controls, who explored the building without any distractions. The results showed that a doorway effect was evident in the control, no-distractor condition. The visuospatial distractor task impaired memory for objects, but only when it occurred in the middle of a room, possibly because it separated the representation of the encapsulating room into different events. When this task was performed in the doorway, however, its effects overlapped with, and did not add to, the spatial boundary effect. Together these findings show that both spatial boundaries and spatial distractor tasks can segment memory for experience in an immersive VR environment.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2002-2015"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13461692/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146054619","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-03-14DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01850-0
Lucas Raynal, Evelyne Clément, Hippolyte Gros, Emmanuel Sander
{"title":"Bridging the \"retrieval gap\": Familiar schema-governed categories support reminding of disparate events.","authors":"Lucas Raynal, Evelyne Clément, Hippolyte Gros, Emmanuel Sander","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01850-0","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01850-0","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>We investigated the role of surface and structural similarities in the retrieval of everyday life events by means of a novel experimental paradigm in which participants could report any memories that came to mind while reading anecdotes instantiating familiar Schema-Governed Categories (SCGs, e.g., making up an excuse). Based on the idea that the availability of memories sharing both surface and structural similarities may conceal participants' ability to retrieve purely structural matches, we presented participants with short narratives describing associations of surfaces and structures which are either usually encountered (e.g., making up an excuse not to hang out with someone, Experiment 1) or less frequent in everyday life (e.g., making up an excuse not to go to an art exhibition, Experiment 2). The results from Experiment 1 replicated the traditional finding that when they are available, memories combining surface and structural similarities prevail over purely structural matches. However, Experiment 2 revealed that when a more direct competition was set between purely surface and purely structural matches, structurally based retrievals were the most frequent. Experiment 3 showed that target cues deprived of any surface features (e.g., making up an excuse) elicited more retrievals of usual than unusual surface/structure combos, suggesting the influence of association frequency in analogical retrieval. The data provide the first line of evidence suggesting that participants rely on highly familiar SGCs to process structural encodings and retrieve past experiences based on structural similarities. We discuss the implications of these findings regarding current theories of analogical retrieval holding that this process is predominantly guided by surface similarities.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"1965-1980"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147460525","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-04-18DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01882-6
Albandri S Alotaibi
{"title":"The influence of emotional scenes and attentional bias on visual working memory: Insights from a 3-back task.","authors":"Albandri S Alotaibi","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01882-6","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01882-6","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The present study investigated the effects of emotional valence-specifically, negative, positive, and neutral affective content-on visual working memory performance under conditions of sustained cognitive demand. Participants (N = 127), all university students from Saudi Arabia, completed a culturally adapted version of the 3-back task in which images from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) were categorized by emotional valence and presented in homogeneous blocks. The primary aim was to examine whether emotional content modulates core aspects of working memory, including accuracy, reaction time, perceptual sensitivity (d'), and decision bias (criterion c), particularly when continuous updating is required. Results indicated a significant advantage for negative stimuli in terms of accuracy, with participants demonstrating higher performance in this condition relative to both neutral and positive blocks. Conversely, reaction times were fastest in the positive condition, though no evidence of a speed-accuracy trade-off was observed. Sensitivity, as indexed by d', remained statistically equivalent across conditions; however, criterion c analyses revealed a more conservative response tendency in the positive condition. Age was negatively correlated with accuracy in the negative condition, suggesting early-emerging shifts in emotion-cognition dynamics. These findings are discussed in relation to cultural context and signal detection theory, with implications for models of affective modulation in visual working memory.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2436-2452"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147718432","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-04-14DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01874-6
Asher Koriat
{"title":"Confidence judgments, feelings of knowing and judgments of learning: Towards a common framework.","authors":"Asher Koriat","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01874-6","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01874-6","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This study investigates the hypothesis that the theoretical framework underlying the Self-Consistency Model of subjective confidence can be extended to feeling of knowing (FOK) judgments and to judgments of learning (JOLs). According to this model, when individuals make a binary choice, their confidence in the selected option derives from the internal consistency among cues that are sampled randomly from a shared pool - termed collective wisdomware. Consequently, confidence should increase with the popularity of the chosen option (the \"consensuality effect\") and should predict the likelihood that others will select the same option (the \"replicability effect\"). Applying this framework to FOK and JOL revealed that both judgments exhibit robust consensuality and replicability effects. Results for JOLs further indicated that items differ reliably in the extent to which they elicit replicable cues across different encounters, and that signs of shared collective wisdomware exist even among first graders. The implications of these findings for the characterization and development of collective wisdomware are discussed.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2365-2382"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13461756/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147677948","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Memory & CognitionPub Date : 2026-08-01Epub Date: 2026-03-02DOI: 10.3758/s13421-026-01861-x
Florian Hintz, Mohammad Momenian
{"title":"Linguistic experience and processing speed differentially affect lexical retrieval and structural assembly during language production.","authors":"Florian Hintz, Mohammad Momenian","doi":"10.3758/s13421-026-01861-x","DOIUrl":"10.3758/s13421-026-01861-x","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Our ability to produce words and sentences relies on lexical retrieval and structural assembly processes, which are supported by domain-general skills. In the present study, we adopted an individual-differences approach to examine how linguistic experience and domain-general skills jointly contribute to language production at different levels of complexity. Our participants (n = 169) completed three production tasks that capitalized on lexical retrieval (picture naming) and structural assembly (phrase generation and sentence generation) processes, respectively. In addition, they completed 15 tests measuring linguistic experience, processing speed, working memory, and nonverbal reasoning. Our analyses of speech onset latencies and speech durations showed that linguistic experience was primarily associated with faster speech initiation, particularly in picture naming, consistent with its role in supporting efficient lexical access. In contrast, processing speed emerged as a robust predictor of both earlier speech initiation and shorter utterance durations, with effects that were disproportionately larger for phrase and sentence production than for picture naming, highlighting its role in coordinating multiword structural assembly under time pressure. Working memory was linked to a redistribution of planning across time, with higher capacity associated with longer onset latencies but shorter speech durations. By integrating multiple predictors, our study provides novel insights into the cognitive architecture underlying language production and highlights the value of a holistic individual-differences approach.</p>","PeriodicalId":48398,"journal":{"name":"Memory & Cognition","volume":" ","pages":"2165-2186"},"PeriodicalIF":1.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13461654/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147345468","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}