The concreteness effect from memory illusions’ perspective: the DIM-HA effect

Abstract

AbstractA vast body of evidence has shown that concrete nouns are processed faster and more accurately than abstract nouns in a variety of cognitive tasks. This phenomenon is widely known as the concreteness effect and explanations for its occurrence seem to reflect differences in processing and organization between both type of concepts. While there is considerable evidence to support this concrete effect, the nature of these differences is still controversial. In developing this explanation, we have proposed a relatively different approach from a false memory perspective using the DRM paradigm. Three different experiments were created to address the importance of association in creating concrete and abstract false memories. Results showed that false recognition rates differed significantly between concrete and abstract critical words when they were associated strongly with their respective lists, which led to a higher proportion of abstract false alarms both in behavioral and electrophysiological experiments. The principal outcomes were discussed in terms of theories of associative activation and qualitatively different representation.