The generation effect: Further tests of the lexical activation hypothesis

Abstract

Three experiments compared recognition memory for word versus nonword responses when they had been either read or generated using a rhyme rule and either a word or nonword stimulus. That is, either the word shop or the nonword thop was generated from either the word chop or the nonwordphop. In Experiment 1, the lexicality ofthe stimulus and response terms was manipulated orthogonally between subjects; in Experiments 2 and 3, it was manipulated orthogonally within subjects. In Experiment 3, subjects also made a lexical (word-nonword) decision about each response term after it had been read or generated. In all three experiments, memory performance was better for generated than read responses. This generation effect occurred only ifthe response term was a word, regardless ofwhether the stimulus term was a word or a nonword. These results are discussed in terms ofthe roles that lexical memory and response unitization play in the generation effect.People are better able to recall or recognize words if they have previously produced or generated them than if they have merely read them. This so-called generation effect was first studied extensively by Slameckaand Graf (1978). In their generatecondition, subjects used a specified rule (e.g., antonym) and a stimulus item followed by a single letter (e.g., HOT-C __J to generate and say aloud the target responseitem (COLD);in their read condition, subjects also said aloudthe response item (COLD), but both the stimulus and response items were presented intact (i.e., HOT-COLD). Subsequent tests showedbetter memoryfor the response itemsfrom the generatepairs than from the read pairs. This generation effect occurs for a wide range of materials and study and testing con-

The generation effect extended: Memory enhancement for generation cues

“…When Experiment 3 was planned and conducted (before Experiment 2), reports of several failures to obtain a generation effect for nonsense responses (McElroy & Slamecka, 1982;Nairne, Pusen, & Widner, 1985;Payne et al, 1986) appeared to provide the conditions needed for a novel test of the generation effect for cues. The planned strategy was to use materials (nonsense responses) for which it was implausible that a generation effect for cues could be an artifact of a generation effect on responses.…”

Application of the Self-Generation Effect to the Learning of Blissymbols by Persons Presenting with a Severe Aphasia

“…Previous studies have shown that it failed to emerge with stimuli that were new, unfamiliar or meaningless (Gardiner & Hampton, 1985;Lutz, Briggs, & Cain, 2003;McElroy & Slamecka, 1982;Nairne, Pusen and Widner, 1985;Nairne & Widner, 1987;Payne, Neely & Burns, 1986). Lutz et al (2003) found a stronger SGE for familiar clichés when contrasted with unfamiliar sentences from textbooks.…”

“…The method for eliciting the SGE in the present study was guided by the prominent semantic activation theory, which states that the effortful act of generating a stimulus item, such as a word or a picture, activates its location in the lexical/semantic network and enhances its retrieval from memory (Graf, 1980;McElroy & Slamecka, 1982;Nairne et al, 1985;Payne et al, 1986). Early studies by Jacoby (1978) and Slamecka & Graf (1978) showed the SGE to be a function of the individual's processing of stimuli in an elaborate way in the generation condition and in an unelaborated, non-distinctive manner in the non-generation condition.…”

The generation effect: Software demonstrating the phenomenon

“…McElroy and Siamecka (1982) found that there was no generation effect for nonwords (see also Nairne et al, 1985;Payne et al, 1986; but see Johns & Swanson, 1988, for a generation effect with nonwords). Nairne et al (1985) found no generation effect with low-frequency words.…”

“…They dubbed this phenomenon the generation effect. This effect has since received a lot of attention (Begg & Snider, 1987;Begg, Vinski, Frankovich, & Holgate, 1991;Burns, 1990Burns, , 1992Gardiner, Smith, Richardson, Burrows, & Williams, 1985; Glisky & Rabinowitz, 1985;Greenwald & Johnson, 1989;Hirshman & Bjork, 1988;Johns & Swanson, 1988;McDaniel, Waddill, & Einstein, 1988; McElroy & Siamecka, 1982;Nairne, Pusen, & Widner, 1985;Payne, Neely, & Burns, 1986;Schmidt & Cherry, 1989; Siamecka & Fevreiski, 1983;Slamecka & Katsaiti, 1987;Watkins & Sechler, 1988). This report describes software that allows students to participate in generation effect experiments.…”