Abstract
Previous studies have shown that self-generated information is better remembered than information that has been read passively. To further examine this subsequent memory effect, we investigated the effect of five different linguistic relationships on memory encoding. Ninety subjects were administered 60 paired associates during an encoding condition: 30 of the second words from each pair were to be read aloud and 30 were to be self-generated from clues as to the correct word. Word pairs were composed of five linguistic relationships: category, rhyme, opposite, synonym, and association. Subsequently, subjects were presented with the words that were read or generated in a forced recognition memory task. Overall, reading accuracy was higher than generation accuracy during the encoding phase (all P < 0.001). During the recognition phase, subjects' performance was better on the generate than on the read conditions for opposite, synonym, category, and association relationships (all P < 0.05), with no difference in the rhyme relationship. These results confirm previous findings that self-generated information is better remembered than read information and suggest that this advantage may be mediated by using opposite, synonym, category, and association relationships, while rhyme relationship may not extend such an advantage. These findings may have implications for future studies of memory interventions in healthy controls and subjects with cognitive impairments.
Highlights
Previous research has shown that self-generated information is better remembered than information that is passively received (Slamecka and Graf 1978; Basso et al 1994; Schefft et al 2008a,b)
Kircher et al (2011) found that individuals were able to generate more words that fit the category of a target word than words that rhymed with a target word in a set of verbal fluency tasks; the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data collected in this study showed partially overlapping, but distinctive brain networks involved in this cognitive process including left inferior frontal gyrus, middle and superior temporal gyri, and the contralateral right cerebellum in generating rhyming and categorically related words, while rhyming showed additional activation in the left inferior parietal region
Reading words aloud is linguistically less complex than self-generating word pairs and requires less focus/attention decreasing the overall level of involvement in the process of encoding
Summary
Previous research has shown that self-generated information is better remembered than information that is passively received (Slamecka and Graf 1978; Basso et al 1994; Schefft et al 2008a,b). Improved memory performance on paired associates resulting from self-generation compared with passive reading has been demonstrated in neurologically healthy adults (Slamecka and Graf 1978; Schefft and Biederman 1990; Basso et al 1994; Vannest et al 2012) and in patients with traumatic brain injury (Schefft et al 2008a), seizure disorders (Schefft et al 2008b), Alzheimer’s disease (Multhaup and Balota 1997; Barrett et al 2000), multiple sclerosis (Chiaravalloti and Deluca 2002), Parkinson’s disease (Barrett et al 2000), schizophrenia (Vinogradov et al 1997), and temporal or frontal lobectomy (Smith 1996).
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