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Related Experiment Videos

The revelation effect: when disguising test items induces recognition.

M J Watkins1, Z F Peynircioglu

  • 1Department of Psychology, Rice University, Houston, Texas 77251.

Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition
|November 1, 1990
PubMed
Summary

People are more likely to believe they have seen something before if it is presented in a disguised or revealed format. This "revealed item bias" affects memory judgments for various stimuli.

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Human Memory
  • Perception

Background:

  • Prior research indicates memory judgments can be influenced by presentation format.
  • Understanding biases in recognition memory is crucial for accurate recall assessment.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate a bias where disguised or revealed items are perceived as more likely to have been presented previously.
  • To determine the conditions under which this bias occurs and does not occur.

Main Methods:

  • Participants judged the prior occurrence of stimuli presented in various disguised formats (unfolded words, transposed letters, rotated letters/words, Roman numerals, equations).
  • Control conditions involved standard presentation and judgments on typicality, lexicality, frequency, and recent encounters.

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Main Results:

  • A consistent bias was observed where disguised or revealed items were judged as more likely to have been presented before, regardless of actual prior presentation.
  • This bias was specific to prior occurrence judgments and absent when assessing typicality, lexicality, frequency, or recent encounters.

Conclusions:

  • The manner of stimulus presentation significantly impacts subjective judgments of prior occurrence.
  • This 'revealed item bias' highlights a potential flaw in memory assessment when stimuli require effortful processing or discovery.