title: Effects of attention and confidence on the hypothesized ERP correlates of recollection and familiarity.
abstract: Dual-process theories suggest that recognition memory is determined by two separate processes: familiarity and recollection. Experiment 1 behaviorally replicated past studies using the remember/know procedure to indicate that the amount of attention devoted to study influences both recollection and familiarity, but recollection more strongly. Experiments 1 and 2 assessed the effects of attention on two ERP components that have been hypothesized to be related to familiarity (FN400 old/new effect, 300-500 ms, anterior) and recollection (parietal old/new effect, 400-800 ms, posterior). Parietal old/new effects were reduced by divided attention, but FN400 old/new effects were not. Parietal ERPs (400-800 ms) in experiment 2 increased with confidence in recognizing old items, but not new items. These results support the hypothesis that the parietal old/new effect is related to recollection.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Colorado, Campus Box 345, Boulder, CO 80309-0345, USA. tcurran@psych.colorado.edu
authors.forename: Tim
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Curran
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000502:physiology; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D010296:Parietal Lobe / Q000502:physiology*; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted; D014706:Verbal Learning / Q000502:physiology*