Associative Organization in Recognition Memory

Abstract

This article reports an investigation of the effect of organization in word recognition. Ss learned lists of 30 words, 15 presented in associatively related triplets and 15 presenred in associatively unrelated triplets. No difference was found between lists when d' values were used as a measure of recognition performance. However, Ss gave higher confidence judgments for hits and false alarms from associatively related triplets. The results suggest that the familiarity distributions of old and new items may have shifted upward under the organized condition.