Win some, lose some: Hypermnesia for actions reflects increased item-specific processing

Abstract

Memory for simple action phrases (e.g., "Break a match") improves when subjects perform the actions at study. The relative contribution of item-specific and relational processing to this enactment effect has been an issue of considerable debate. It was addressed in the present study by examining hypermnesia in a multiple-test free recall paradigm, based on the assumptions that itemspecific processing increases the probability of intertest gains and relational processing protects against intertest forgetting (e.g., Bums, 1993;Klein,Loftus, Kihlstrom, & Aseron, 1989). It was found that the enactment condition produced both significantly more gains and more losses than did the nonenactment condition, resulting in a net gain (hypermnesia) for the enactment condition. The results suggest that enactment promotes item-specific processing at the expense of relational processing.It is a well-established empirical fact that memory for action phrases (e.g., "Break a match") benefits greatly when the subjects perform the actions relative to when they simply read or listen to the phrases (for a review, see Cohen, 1989;Engelkamp & Zimmer, 1994). The source of this "enactment" effect remains disputed, however. Although it is generally agreed that enactment adds itemspecific information to the "memory trace" (e.g., Backman, Nilsson, & Chalom, 1986;Helstrup, 1986;Nyberg, 1993;Saltz & Donnenwerth-Nolan, 1981;Zimmer & Engelkamp, 1989), the effect on relational processing is unclear.Item-specific processing is assumed to increase the distinctiveness of an item in memory by emphasizing features that discriminate a particular item from other items, whereas relational processing is assumed to increase the organization of items in memory by focusing on features that are shared and by encoding interitem associations (Hunt & Einstein, 1981). Some authors claim that the enactment effect is due to increased relational processing, as well as item-specific processing (e.g., Backman et al., 1986); others argue that the effect is due exclusively to increased item-specific processing (e.g., Engelkamp & Zimmer, 1994, 1996Zimmer & Engelkamp, 1989). Engelkamp (1995) has even suggested that enactment may hinder relational processing by forcing attention to itemspecific information and by hampering encoding of relational information. Both views draw on comparisons of adjusted ratio of clustering (ARC) scores (Roenker, Thompson, & Brown, 1971)-an index of organization in free recall of categorized lists-for support. Some researchers have reported significantly higher ARC scores in recall for subject-performed tasks (SPTs) than in recall for verbal tasks (VTs) (Backman et al., 1986), indicating increased relational processing, whereas others have failed to find any difference (Engelkamp & Zimmer, 1996;Zimmer & Engelkamp, 1989), suggesting that enhanced relational processing does not contribute to the enactment effect. Engelkamp and Zimmer (1996) recently tested the hypothesis that differences in materials were responsible for the previous incompatibl...

Differential relational encoding of categorical information in memory for action events

“…Evidence of the assumption that VTs allow for better intentional relational encoding than do SPTs has been presented before for unrelated items (see, e.g., Engelkamp, Mohr, & Zimmer, 1991;Olofsson, 1997). In these studies, it is assumed that enactment hinders the intentional building of interitem subjective associations between unrelated actions.…”

Perceptual interference at encoding enhances item-specific encoding and disrupts relational encoding: Evidence from multiple recall tests

“…First, there has been extensive debate on the extent to which category clustering provides a pure measure of relational processing (see, e.g., Bums, 1993; see Murphy, 1979, for a review). Second, the generality of clustering studies is limited because they require the use ofcategorized materials (see, e.g., Bums, 1993;Olofsson, 1997). Similar limitations exist for using order reconstruction as a measure of relational processing.…”

“…These procedural differences may induce strategy differences such as increased attention to serial position at encoding, or increased reliance on serial retrieval strategies during recall (see Bums, 1996, for related discussion). Klein, Loftus, Kihlstrom, and Aseron (1989) developed an alternative method for measuring item-specific and relational influences in recall (e.g., Bums, 1993;Olofsson, 1997). In this procedure, subjects are given multiple recall tests, which sometimes leads to an overall increase in recall on later tests (a phenomenon called hypermnesia; e.g., Payne, 1987).…”

“…When multiple recall tests are used, some items are recalled on later tests that have not been recalled earlier (item gains), whereas other items that have been successfully recalled earlier may not be recalled on later tests (item losses). Klein et al (1989;Bums, 1993;McDaniel, Moore, & Whiteman, 1998;Olofsson, 1997) demonstrated that conditions fostering item-specific encoding increase the probability of item gains, whereas conditions fostering relational encoding protect against item losses.…”

Directed forgetting of actions by younger and older adults

“…There is some empirical evidence that item-specific processing is increased by performance, whereas relational processing is decreased. For example, Olofsson (1997) examined memory for a list of action phrases that were either performed or not performed. Following presentation, participants were given three successive free-recall tests.…”