title: The effects of unitization on the contribution of familiarity and recollection processes to associative recognition memory: evidence from event-related potentials.
abstract: Familiarity and recollection are two independent cognitive processes involved in recognition memory. It is traditionally believed that both familiarity and recollection can support item recognition, whereas only recollection can support associative recognition. Here, using a standard associative recognition task, we examined whether associative retrieval of unitized associations involved differential patterns of familiarity and recollection processes relative to non-unitized associations. The extent of engagement of familiarity and recollection processes during associative retrieval was estimated by using event-related potentials (ERPs). Twenty participants studied compound words and unrelated word pairs during encoding. Subsequently, they were asked to decide whether a presented word pair was intact, rearranged, or a new pair while electroencephalogram (EEG) was recorded. ERP results showed that compound words evoked a significant early frontal old/new effect (associated with familiarity) between ERPs to intact and rearranged word pairs, whereas this effect disappeared for the unrelated word pairs. In addition, the left parietal old/new effect (associated with recollection) between ERPs to intact and rearranged word pairs was greater for compounds than for unrelated word pairs. These findings suggest that unitization enhances the contribution of both familiarity and recollection processes to associative recognition.
authors.affiliation: Center on Aging Psychology, Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.
authors.forename: Zhiwei
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.affiliation: Center on Aging Psychology, Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research Center, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China. Electronic address: lijuan@psych.ac.cn.
authors.forename: Juan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Institute of Developmental Psychology, School of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China.
authors.forename: Fengqiu
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.affiliation: Department of Behavioral Science, University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, KY, USA.
authors.forename: Lucas S
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Broster
authors.affiliation: Department of Behavioral Science, University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, KY, USA.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.affiliation: Xingtai University, Xingtai, HeBei 054000, China.
authors.forename: Mingjing
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Xi
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001245:Association Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D013997:Time Factors; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Associative recognition; Event-related potentials; Familiarity; Recollection; Unitization