Karen Rodriguez
California State University Of San Marcos
Table of Contents
Title page………………………………………………………………………………………….1
Table of contents…………………………………………………………………………………..2
A review of McDermott & Roediger (1995)……………………………………………………...3
A review of Flegal & Reuter- Lorenz (2014)……………………………………………………..6
References…………………………………………………………………………………………8
A review of McDermott and Roediger (1995) False memories are recalled events that never happened or events that are recalled differently than from how they really happened. In Deeses’s (1959) study he analyzed memory for word lists in a single trial by using the free-recall paradigm. In this study, McDermott and Roediger (1995) based their research on the earlier studies of Deese. The two main goals of these researchers were to to try and replicate Deese’s (1959) findings and also extend his paradigm to recognition tests. The researchers were interested in whether subjects would recall and have a false recognition on words that were not represented in a list given. McDermott and Roediger conducted two experiments but this summary focuses on their first experiment, which replicates Deese’s observations on false recall. McDermott & Roediger, (1995) examined the subject’s false recognition and false recall on words that were not presented to them on the list. They also examined the subjects’ confidence in which they would accept or reject the words that were not presented to them as being part of the list given to them. The researchers did not make specific predictions regarding false recall, however they examined how many subjects would recall words that were not on the list compared to how many would recall if the non presented word was on the list or not. A total of 36 undergraduates from Rice University participated in the study as a course requirement for their psychology 308, class (McDermott & Roediger, 1995). In the study, six lists were made from the material listed in Deese’s article (1959). Six words were chosen from his study that had the highest intrusion rates: sweet, sleep, chair, needle, mountain, and rough. For each of the six words, 12 words that were associated with the main one were listed (Jenkin’s & Russell, 1954). For example, for the word chair the 12 words that were related to chair were: table, legs, sit, seat, soft, desk, arm, rest, stool, wood, sofa, and cushion. Twelve studied and thirteen non-studied words were included in the 42-recognition test. McDermott & Roediger, (1995) formed three types of non studied words: 6 words from the list, 12 words that were not related to any of the six words on the list, and 12 words that were hardly relate to the words on the list. For example, they chose the words couch and floor for the chair list and conducted the test sequence in blocks. Each block of words began with a familiar word and ended with a word that was unstudied while the other items were put in between. The 36 subjects were tested in a group during a class meeting. First, they were told that they would hear a list a words and then had to recall the words by writing them down on a booklet. They were instructed to write down the last words from the list and then write down the rest of the words they recalled in order. The subjects were also told to be confident in the words they wrote down that they seemed to recall. The researcher read “list 1” then named the list of words and had the undergraduates recall the words they remembered. This procedure was the same for the six lists of words. After the sixth list the subjects were told that they would receive another test. In the second test they were given words on a sheet and were told to rate their confidence in which they thought that word was on the list of words. At the end of the experiment, the reaserchers read words aloud words and asked the subjects to raise their hands if they thought the words were part of the six lists. Most of the