Previous research indicates that developmental trends in semantic and phonological false memory are dissociated. Using the Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm, seven experiments investigated these trends as well as manipulations that may be used to increase false memory in both children and adults. Experiments 1 and 2 provided evidence for dissociated developmental trends such that semantic false memory increases with age and phonological false memory does not. Experiment 1 also demonstrated that massing associates, as opposed to spacing them within a longer list increases both semantic and phonological false memory. In Experiment 2, presenting associates within a story format was used to increase semantic false memory levels in children but not adults. Experiments 3 and 4 further investigated semantic false memory for long and short lists and stories. False memory increased across development for short stories and long lists only. Importantly, these developmental effects were nullified when short and long study materials were matched for presentation duration. Experiments 5 and 6 investigated developmental effects of Length in phonological false memory for lists that converge on one critical lure. False memory increased with age for long lists but not for short lists. Moreover, controlling for presentation duration did not reliably affect this result. Experiment 7 provided limited support for the overadditivity of false memory for hybrid lists. Taken together, these experiments demonstrate that semantic false memory increases with age and that developmental trajectories for phonological false memory are less clear and appear to be determined by the nature of study and test conditions. The findings of this thesis are discussed within both activation-monitoring and fuzzy trace accounts of the false memory illusion. Although support is provided for both models, activation accounts provide a more-comprehensive account of all the results detailed in this thesis.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:552830 |
| Date | January 2010 |
| Creators | Swannell, Ellen R. |
| Publisher | Lancaster University |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
Page generated in 0.0012 seconds