S1 (FriAM 1-65) - The Psychonomic Society

Papers 197–203 Saturday Afternoon
SYMPOSIUM: Toward a Cognitive Psychology of Collective
Memory: Methods, Data, and Theories
Regency ABC, Saturday Afternoon, 1:30–3:50
Chaired by Amanda J. Barnier, Macquarie University
1:30–1:45 (197)
Toward a Cognitive Psychology of Collective Memory: Methods,
Data, and Theories. AMANDA J. BARNIER, Macquarie University—
In recent years, across many disciplines, there has been increasing interest
in the relationships among individuals remembering alone, individuals
remembering in a group, and the group itself remembering.
Cognitive psychologists have contributed a range of clever paradigms
to this area, which map the reciprocal influences of individuals and
their social groups on both remembering and forgetting. In this symposium,
presenters describe experiments that used a range of paradigms
(including collaborative recall, social contagion, and adaptations
of retrieval-induced forgetting), that focused on a range of target
material (from relatively simple material to more complex, emotional,
personal memories), and that collected data from a range of participants
(including younger adults or older adults, from laboratory settings
and applied settings). Based on these methods and data, the presenters
develop and discuss theoretical interpretations that will best
capture the cognitive psychology of individual and collective memory.
1:50–2:05 (198)
Individual and Group Retrieval Efforts Modulate Later Memory
Outcomes. HELENA M. BLUMEN & SUPARNA RAJARAM, Stony
Brook University (read by Suparna Rajaram)—Group retrieval is a
common social practice and one that is often emphasized in educational
settings (e.g., study groups). Yet, the effects of group retrieval on later
individual memory remain poorly understood. To understand this relationship,
we compared three hypotheses—the individual-strategy
hypothesis, the combined-strategy hypothesis and the group-strategy
hypothesis—and tested the roles of two opposing cognitive processes,
namely, anticipated benefits from re-exposure to study material during
collaboration and losses from retrieval disruption that can occur
because of other group members’ output. Participants studied unrelated
words and completed three successive recall trials in one of four
conditions—III (individual–individual–individual), ICI (individual–
collaborative–individual), CII (collaborative–individual–individual),
and CCI (collaborative–collaborative–individual). The results support
the group-strategy hypothesis and the individual-strategy hypothesis
by showing that integrating other group members’ output through repeated
group recalls (CCI) and securing individual retrieval organization
prior to group recall (ICI) are important for benefiting from reexposure
during group collaboration.
2:10–2:25 (199)
Collaboration Among Older Adults: The Role of Retrieval Manipulations.
MICHELLE L. MEADE, Montana State University, &
HENRY L. ROEDIGER III, Washington University—Age differences
in collaborative inhibition were examined across repeated retrieval attempts.
Subjects studied categorized word lists and were then given
two consecutive recall tests and a final recognition test. On the first
recall test, subjects were given cued or forced recall instructions and
recalled the lists either alone or in collaboration with another subject
of the same age group. Collaborative inhibition was found for both
young and older adults on cued and forced recall tests. Of interest was
how this initial recall influenced subsequent memory performance.
The subsequent cued recall test and the final recognition test were
each taken individually. No lasting effect of collaborative inhibition
was obtained when young and older adults were subsequently tested
on an individual cued recall test or when subjects were tested on a
final recognition test.
2:30–2:45 (200)
The Mystery of Stimulated Cognition in Collaborative Recall.
31
VERLIN B. HINSZ, North Dakota State University—People tend to
believe that other people facilitate their recall of temporarily forgotten
material. This belief is akin to socially cued recall and is consistent
with the notion of stimulated cognition in that social interaction
creates new solutions and responses. In contrast, combinations-ofcontributions
theory holds that group interaction cannot be truly creative
and that group performance cannot exceed an optimal combination
of the member contributions (e.g., memories). These contrasting
perspectives are examined in a laboratory experiment involving the recall
of information from a murder mystery. The recall performance of
interacting dyads is compared to relevant individual conditions. Consistent
with earlier research, dyads were found to achieve higher levels
of recall performance, but did not exceed that expected from a direct
combination of dyad member recollections. Moreover, the results
demonstrated collaborative interference rather than socially cued recall.
The results from a number of recall measures are inconsistent
with the stimulated cognition perspective.
2:50–3:05 (201)
Interpersonal Source Monitoring of Eyewitness Evidence. D.
STEPHEN LINDSAY, C. A. ELIZABETH BRIMACOMBE, LEORA C.
DAHL, & MELISSA A. BOYCE, University of Victoria—When one
person listens to another’s memory report, the auditor evaluates (if
only implicitly) the veracity of the speaker’s report. Such evaluations
may be based on beliefs regarding the speaker’s expertise and/or on
supposed cues to reliability in the speaker’s behavior (e.g., fluency,
amount of detail, apparent confidence). My colleague Elizabeth
Brimacombe, our students, and I have been exploring interpersonal
metamemory in the context of simulated forensic investigations in
which subject/investigators interview a witness to a video-taped
crime, search a data base of potential suspects, rate the probability that
their suspect is the culprit (p[S = C]), administer a lineup identification
test to the witness, and re-rate p[S = C]. We find that undergraduate
subject/investigators put far too much stock in witnesses, especially
under conditions that lead witnesses to perform poorly, and that
subject/investigators are as swayed by unreliable witnesses as by reliable
ones. I’ll review some of these experiments and discuss their
implications.
3:10–3:25 (202)
Socially Shared Retrieval-Induced Forgetting of People’s Flashbulb
Memories of September 11. WILLIAM HIRST & ALIN COMAN,
New School for Social Research—Something as commonplace as a
conversation can shape and reshape memories. Although most work
has focused on memory implantation, Cuc, Koppel, and Hirst (2007)
recently demonstrated that silences in a conversation—specifically, a
speakers’ failure to recall aspects of a memory shared by a listener—
will induce the listener to forget the unmentioned material more than
would be expected if the conversation had never taken place. We extend
this finding of socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting to
emotionally intense material and to conversations about different, but
related memories. We collected in a structured interview flashbulb
memories of September 11, formed pairs, and then asked each pair to
share their memories. A final recognition test for the information collected
in the structured interview followed. Response times were
recorded. Socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting was observed.
Even when one talks about different emotionally intense events, conversations
can alter memory.
3:30–3:45 (203)
Social Contagion of Autobiographical Memories. AMANDA J.
BARNIER, Macquarie University, TASNEEM KHAN, University of
New South Wales, & CELIA B. HARRIS & JOHN SUTTON, Macquarie
University—Roediger and Meade’s social contagion paradigm
illustrates the impact of collaboration on individual memory. To examine
its impact on more complex, self-relevant material, we adapted
the procedure to autobiographical memories. In Session 1, participants
individually recalled recent events such as their 18th birthday.