University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Remembering you read “doctoral dissertation”: Phrase frequency effects in recall and recognition memory

Jacobs, Cassandra L.

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JACOBS-DISSERTATION-2017.pdf

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/97364

Description

Title
Remembering you read “doctoral dissertation”: Phrase frequency effects in recall and recognition memory
Author(s)
Jacobs, Cassandra L.
Issue Date
2017-04-18
Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)
Dell, Gary S.
Doctoral Committee Chair(s)
Dell, Gary S.
Committee Member(s)
  • Federmeier, Kara
  • Benjamin, Aaron S.
  • Sahakyan, Lili
  • Fisher, Cynthia
Department of Study
Psychology
Discipline
Psychology
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Date of Ingest
2017-08-10T19:15:07Z
Keyword(s)
  • Recognition memory
  • Recall
  • Multiword expressions
  • Phrase frequency
Abstract
Speakers understand and produce common words like cat more easily than less common words like panther. Similarly, this pattern of behavior shows up at larger levels, processing common combinations of words like alcoholic beverages more quickly than less common ones like psychic nephew. As a result, many researchers have concluded that these combinations of words have word-like representations in long-term memory as a way of explaining how both words and phrases can be easier to process the more common they are. This dissertation challenges these assumptions by using episodic memory tasks such as yes-no recognition and immediate free recall of combinations of words, under the premise that word-like representations for phrases should lead to word-like patterns of episodic memory. The results and a corresponding verbal model demonstrate that combinations of words are processed more easily not because phrases have the same structures as words, but because of the strength of association between the two words within a phrase, which leads to facilitated processing.
Graduation Semester
2017-05
Type of Resource
text
Permalink
http://hdl.handle.net/2142/97364
Copyright and License Information
Copyright 2017 Cassandra Jacobs

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