Theories of memory consolidation suggest that initially rich, vivid memories become more gist-like over time. However, it is unclear whether gist-like representations reflect a loss of detail through degradation or the blending of experiences into statistical averages, and whether the strength of these representations increases, decreases, or…

Models of statistical learning do not place constraints on the complexity of the memory structure that is formed during statistical learning, while empirical studies using the statistical learning task have only examined the formation of simple memory structures (e.g., two-way binding). On the contrary, the memory literature, using explicit memory…

The temporal contiguity effect (TCE) is the tendency for the recall of one event to cue recall of other events originally experienced nearby in time. Retrieved context theory proposes that the TCE results from fundamental properties of episodic memory: binding of events to a drifting context representation during encoding and the reinstatement of…

Attention allocation determines the information that is encoded into memory. Can participants learn to optimally allocate attention based on what types of information are most likely to change? The current study examined whether participants could incidentally learn that changes to either high spatial frequency (HSF) or low spatial frequency (LSF)…

A large body of evidence shows an animacy effect on memory in that animate entities are better remembered than inanimate ones. Yet, the reason for this mnemonic prioritization remains unclear. In the survival processing literature, the assumption that richness of encoding is responsible for adaptive memory benefits has received substantial…

There is converging evidence that the feeling of conscious recollection is usually accompanied by the bound retrieval of context features of the encoding episode (e.g., Meiser, Sattler, & Weiber, 2008). Recently, however, important limiting conditions have been identified for the binding between context features in memory. For example, focusing on…

Research from the adaptive memory framework shows that thinking about words in terms of their survival value in an incidental learning task enhances their free recall relative to other semantic encoding strategies and intentional learning (Nairne, Pandeirada, & Thompson, 2008). We found similar results. When participants used incidental…

List-method directed forgetting involves encoding 2 lists, between which half of the participants are told to forget List 1. When participants are free to study however they want, directed forgetting impairs List 1 recall and enhances List 2 recall in the forget group compared with a control remember group. In a large-scale experiment, the current…

The expression of expert motor skills typically involves learning to perform a precisely timed sequence of movements. Research examining incidental sequence learning has relied on a perceptually cued task that gives participants exposure to repeating motor sequences but does not require timing of responses for accuracy. In the 1st experiment, a…

Research on incidental sequence learning typically is concerned with the characteristics of implicit or nonconscious learning. In this article, the authors aim to elucidate the cognitive mechanisms that contribute to the generation of explicit, reportable sequence knowledge. According to the unexpected-event hypothesis (P. A. Frensch, H. Haider,…

S. W. Allen and L. R. Brooks (1991) have shown that exemplar memory can affect categorization even when participants are provided with a classification rule. G. Regehr and L. R. Brooks (1993) argued that stimuli must be individuated for such effects to occur. In this study, the authors further analyze the conditions that yield exemplar effects in…

This article reports an error concerning the article "Directed Forgetting in Incidental Learning and Recognition Testing: Support for a Two-Factor Account" by Lili Sahakyan and Peter F. Delaney ("Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition," Vol. 31, No. 4, pp. 789-801). The article was misidentified in the July issue as an…