title: Adaptive memory: evaluating alternative forms of fitness-relevant processing in the survival processing paradigm.
abstract: Memory may have evolved to preserve information processed in terms of its fitness-relevance. Based on the assumption that the human mind comprises different fitness-relevant adaptive mechanisms contributing to survival and reproductive success, we compared alternative fitness-relevant processing scenarios with survival processing. Participants rated words for relevancy to fitness-relevant and control conditions followed by a delay and surprise recall test (Experiment 1a). Participants recalled more words processed for their relevance to a survival situation. We replicated these findings in an online study (Experiment 2) and a study using revised fitness-relevant scenarios (Experiment 3). Across all experiments, we did not find a mnemonic benefit for alternative fitness-relevant processing scenarios, questioning assumptions associated with an evolutionary account of remembering. Based on these results, fitness-relevance seems to be too wide-ranging of a construct to account for the memory findings associated with survival processing. We propose that memory may be hierarchically sensitive to fitness-relevant processing instructions. We encourage future researchers to investigate the underlying mechanisms responsible for survival processing effects and work toward developing a taxonomy of adaptive memory.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico, United States of America. sandry@nmsu.edu
authors.forename: Joshua
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sandry
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Trafimow
authors.forename: Michael J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Marks
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Rice
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D005239:Fear / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D056084:Genetic Fitness / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007578:Jealousy; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory / Q000502:physiology*; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000523:psychology; D013534:Survival / Q000523:psychology*; D014706:Verbal Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult