Although many associated words are also conceptually related, as indeed Rajaram and Geraci’s were, associative probability is influenced by non-conceptual factors

such as the probability of co-occurrence in language (e.g., hobby-HORSE, grand-PIANO), and in semantic priming studies, association tends to dominate over conceptual relatedness ( Lucas, 2000). In a recent study (Taylor and Henson, in press), we used semantically related primes (that share semantic attributes, e.g., piano-GUITAR) that were not associatively related, in an attempt to isolate the effect of conceptual fluency on recognition memory judgments. When we included these so-called conceptual primes with the standard repetition primes used in most previous studies (with different blocks for each prime-type), we found that they produced the opposite effect: i.e., Conceptual primes increased the likelihood of Selleck C225 (correct) R but not K judgments.1 This occurred simultaneously with the standard increase in K but not R judgments following repetition primes, producing a reliable cross-over interaction between prime-type and R/K judgment. While this cross-over interaction might be used to support at least two distinct contributions to recognition memory, such as recollection and familiarity,

the interpretation click here of the increased R judgments following conceptual primes would appear more difficult to reconcile with conventional theories of recollection. Montelukast Sodium Indeed, as noted above, one popular theory of recollection and familiarity associates conceptual fluency with familiarity, not recollection (Yonelinas, 2002). One possibility is that conceptual primes automatically activate concepts that are semantically related to both the prime and target (test item), consistent with behavioral evidence for subliminal semantic priming (Van den Bussche et al., 2009). If some of these concepts were also generated spontaneously at Study (particularly if the encoding task entails semantic elaboration), then their unconscious activation at Test may

increase the probability of retrieving them in response to the test cue (i.e., increase retrieval of internal source; the type of source that is likely to dominate R judgments in experiments like these that use word lists, where there is little variability in external source information). In support of this hypothesis, the increase in R judgments following conceptual primes occurred only for studied items (Hits), not unstudied items (False Alarms), unlike the typical pattern for repetition primes (that increase both Hits and False Alarms, given a K judgment) – see Taylor and Henson (in press) for further discussion. However, another possibility is that this interaction pattern is an artifact of the standard R/K procedure, in that participants are forced to give either an R judgment or a K judgment (i.e., the response categories are mutually exclusive).