Jove
Visualize
Contact Us
JoVE
x logofacebook logolinkedin logoyoutube logo
ABOUT JoVE
OverviewLeadershipBlogJoVE Help Center
AUTHORS
Publishing ProcessEditorial BoardScope & PoliciesPeer ReviewFAQSubmit
LIBRARIANS
TestimonialsSubscriptionsAccessResourcesLibrary Advisory BoardFAQ
RESEARCH
JoVE JournalMethods CollectionsJoVE Encyclopedia of ExperimentsArchive
EDUCATION
JoVE CoreJoVE BusinessJoVE Science EducationJoVE Lab ManualFaculty Resource CenterFaculty Site
Terms & Conditions of Use
Privacy Policy
Policies

Related Experiment Videos

Contraction bias in memorial quantifying judgment: does it come from a stable compressed memory representation or a

Jerwen Jou1, Gary E Leka, Dawn M Rogers

  • 1University of Texas-Pan American, Department of Psychology and Anthropology, Edinburg, 78541-2999, USA. jjou@panam.edu

The American Journal of Psychology
|December 21, 2004
PubMed
Summary

Related Concept Videos

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by
Same author

Why is "remember" recognition faster than "know" recognition when recollection is supposed to be slower than familiarity-based recognition? A suggested explanation.

Memory & cognition·2026
Same author

Asymmetric item isolation effects: support for a process difference between absolute and relative judgments.

Memory (Hove, England)·2025
Same author

Is "remember"-recognition faster than "know"-recognition an experimental artefact? Revealing properties of recollection and familiarity.

Canadian journal of experimental psychology = Revue canadienne de psychologie experimentale·2025
Same author

Two masked prime arrows simultaneously affect a response to a target: Revealing of an additive unconscious priming effect.

PsyCh journal·2024
Same author

Can an isolated middle-series item make a "Dent" in the bow-shaped serial-position curve of comparative judgments?

Psychological research·2024
Same author

Unconscious Integration of Categorical Relationship of Two Subliminal Numbers in Comparison with "5".

Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland)·2024

Psychophysical judgments show a response bias called regression toward the mean. This study suggests this bias in memory quantification arises from cognitive adaptation, not compressed memory.

Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Psychophysics
  • Human Memory

Background:

  • Regression toward the mean is a common response bias in psychophysical judgments.
  • This bias involves overestimating small values and underestimating large values, also known as response contraction bias.
  • The bias is also observed in magnitude estimation tasks involving memorized quantities.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the nature of regression toward the mean in magnitude estimation of memorized quantities.
  • To determine if the bias stems from cognitive adaptation or a compressed memory representation.
  • To analyze how estimation accuracy changes with repeated judgments and varying stimulus levels.

Main Methods:

  • Participants performed magnitude estimation of alphabetic interval distances between letters.

Related Experiment Videos

  • Interletter distances were varied across different levels.
  • Estimation accuracy and bias were analyzed as a function of repeated trials and stimulus magnitude.

    • Main Results:

    • Underestimated and overestimated values, and the point of least error, varied with the level of judged alphabetic distances.
    • A progressively increasing tendency toward the mean was observed with repeated estimations.
    • Estimation accuracy decreased progressively as the task was repeated.

    Conclusions:

    • Regression toward the mean in memorial quantifying judgment originates from a cognitive adaptation process.
    • The bias is not due to a permanent, compressed memory representation of stimuli.
    • The adaptive significance of this judgment bias is discussed, presenting two opposing viewpoints.