title: Comparison of activation level between true and false items in the DRM paradigm.
abstract: The aim of the present study was to compare the activation levels of true and false memories in the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm. For this purpose, we used a lexical decision task (LDT) that can be considered a relative pure measure of activation. Participants had to study a list of words that were semantically associated to a critical non-presented word (CI), and afterwards had to classify the actually studied words, the CI and new words in the LDT. Results indicated that the classification latency of the CI was the same as actually studied words and shorter than new words. The results might be interpreted as evidence that the false and true memory items have the same activation level and that the false memory effect can be based on the indirect activation of the CI at the encoding.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Second University of Naples, Via Vivaldi, 43, 81100, Caserta, Italy. vincenzopaolo.senese@unina2.it
authors.forename: Vincenzo Paolo
authors.initials: VP
authors.lastname: Senese
authors.forename: Ida
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Sergi
authors.forename: Tina
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Iachini
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001245:Association Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D003657:Decision Making / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D012094:Repression, Psychology; D014825:Vocabulary; D055815:Young Adult