In this study, we used process measures to understand how people recall autobiographical memories in response to different word cues. In Experiment 1, participants provided verbal protocols when cued by object and emotion words. Participants also reported whether memories had come directly to mind. The self-reports and independent ratings of the verbal protocols indicated that directly recalled memories are much faster and more frequent than generated memories and are more prevalent when cued by objects than emotions. Experiment 2 replicated these results without protocols to eliminate any demand characteristics or output interference associated with the protocol method. In Experiment 3, we obtained converging results using a different method for assessing retrieval strategies by asking participants to assess the amount of information required to retrieve memories. The greater proportion of fast direct retrievals when memories are cued by objects accounts for reaction time differences between object and emotion cues, and not the commonly accepted explanation based on ease of retrieval. We argue for a dual-strategies approach that disputes generation as the canonical form of autobiographical memory retrieval and discuss the implication of these findings for the representation of personal events in autobiographical memory.Keywords: autobiographical memory, direct retrieval, generative retrieval, memory organization, memory cueing How do people recall autobiographical memories? The literature provides two answers to this question-answers that correspond to two different research approaches. Psychologists who study involuntary memories tend to focus on directly retrieved memories (Berntsen, 1996(Berntsen, , 1998Berntsen & Hall, 2004;Berntsen & Rubin, 2002;Mace, 2004Mace, , 2005Schlagman & Kvavilashvili, 2008). Work on this topic has shown that cues provided by internal and external contexts sometimes combine to trigger an automatic and effortless retrieval of specific autobiographical-events memories. In contrast, researchers who use the Crovitz cue-word method (Crovitz & Schiffman, 1974) and its variants assume that direct retrieval is uncommon (Haque & Conway, 2001). Instead, they stress the importance of either generation or event (re)construction, and they tend to characterize memory retrieval as a deliberate, effortful, and time-consuming activity (Belli, 1998;Botzung, Denkova, Ciuciu, Scheiber, & Manning, 2008;Burgess & Shallice, 1996;Conway, 1990Conway, , 2005 Despite a widespread tendency to equate retrieval processes with retrieval intentions, it has been noted that direct retrieval can occur when participants recall personal memories in response to word cues (e.g., Barsalou, 1988;Berntsen & Rubin, 2004;Brown, 1993;Conway, 1990;Haque & Conway, 2001). Thus, we took the existence of these two retrieval types, direct and generative, 1 as the starting point for our study and designed it to assess the prevalence and impact of direct retrieval when people are required to recall autobiographical memories in respon...

The Transitional Impact Scale (TIS) advances the measurement of event cognition into the real world. The TIS was created to provide a measure of change for important life transitions, including an index of their transitional properties and magnitude. Pilot work prior to Study 1 led to the creation of a 95-item version (TIS-95). A principal components analysis of TIS-95 (n = 215) resulted in two dimensions that we rotated to a Varimax criterion and interpreted as (1) material change (e.g., "This event changed where I live") and (2) psychological change (e.g., "This event changed the way I think about things"). TIS-95 was reduced to 25 items. In Study 2, the structure of TIS-25 was replicated (n = 531) using the same method. The best 12 items were retained. TIS-12 was evaluated in two random split-half samples (n = 557 and n = 553). These samples produced essentially identical results, as assessed through factor comparison. The cumulative scales formed from items constituting each factor demonstrated good internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha ranged from .79 to .86).

No abstract

Previous research showed that transitional events causing catastrophic and long-lasting changes in group of people's lives (e.g., wars) create autobiographical periods. We investigated whether spinal cord injury (SCI), an involuntary and externally driven disruptive event at the individual level, would also act as a temporal landmark and spawn personal periods and whether these periods have comparable functions and temporal characteristics as those generated at the group level. Thirteen volunteers with SCI recalled a cue-related autobiographical event for each of 22 cue words. Later, participants thought aloud when dating each event. We used the prevalence of injury-related references as an index of the degree to which spinal cord injury affects people's lives. We found frequent references to injury for the period neighboring injury event. Unexpectedly, we also found that SCI resulted in post-injury decrease in event memory. Results imply that SCI provides a temporal landmark and creates an autobiographical period.

No abstract