Item and Associative Information in Human Memory

对人类记忆的研究表明，一个人对一件事的记忆是不同种类信息的结构化集合。例如，如果我们在鸡尾酒会上遇到某人，我们可能会存储有关该人外表的视觉信息，代表该人姓名及其拼写的音位和口头信息，语义信息和印象，以及各种背景上下文。本研究将探讨不同类型的信息在记忆和识别中的作用。研究的重点是项目特定信息和联想信息之间的区别，这一区别在心理学上有着悠久的历史，是当前记忆数学模型的基石。在10个实验（加上几个变化）中，人们将学习单词列表；在不同的实验中，材料的种类和编码条件会有所不同。在列表展示之后，这些人将使用自由和提示回忆以及项目和联想识别测试程序进行测试。这些测试程序在信息的种类和检索过程的种类上有所不同，这些都是足够的性能所必需的。例如，回忆和联想识别主要依赖于单词之间形成的关联，而项目识别则不是。本研究中的一个重要问题是关于非必要信息的作用。例如，在对单个单词进行识别决策时不需要检索关联信息。联想信息起什么作用？在检索过程中，回忆任务需要检索和产生检索到的信息，而识别测试则不需要。这些测试程序之间的比较以及它们对材料和学习条件的操作的敏感性将提供有关记忆中信息的表示和检索的重要信息。此外，这些实验的结果对于测试和开发当前的记忆数学模型将是重要的。

Research in human memory has shown that one's memory for an event is a structured collection of different kinds of information. For example, if we meet someone at a cocktail party, we might store visual information regarding the person's appearance, phonemic and verbal information representing the person's name and its spelling, semantic information and impressions, plus various kinds of background context. This research will investigate the roles of different kinds of information in recall and recognition. The research focuses on the distinction between item-specific and associative information, a distinction which has a long history in psychology, and is a cornerstone of current mathematical models of memory. In 10 experiments (plus several variations), people will study lists of words; the kinds of materials and the encoding conditions will vary across experiments. Following list presentation, these individuals will be tested using free and cued recall and item and associative recognition testing procedures. These testing procedures vary in the kinds of information and the kinds of retrieval processes which are necessary for adequate performance. For example, recall and associative recognition depend primarily on associations formed between words, whereas item recognition does not. An important question in this research regards the role of nonnecessary information. For example, associative information need not be retrieved in making recognition decisions about individual words. What role does the associative information play? Regarding retrieval processes, recall tasks require the recovery and production of retrieved information, whereas recognition testing does not. Comparisons among these test procedures and how they are sensitive to manipulations in materials and study conditions will provide important information concerning the representation and retrieval of information from memory. Moreover, the results of these experiments will be important in testing and developing current mathematical models of memory.