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Related Experiment Videos

Mental model organization

G A Radvansky1, D H Spieler, R T Zacks

  • 1Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing 48224-1117.

Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition
|January 1, 1993
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

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The fan effect in memory is influenced by how information is organized into mental models, not just associations. People, unlike objects, tend to create person-based mental models, reducing the fan effect.

Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Human Memory Research

Background:

  • The fan effect demonstrates how retrieval time increases with the number of associated items.
  • Prior research indicates the fan effect is mediated by mental model organization rather than simple associations.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate factors influencing location-based organization preferences in mental models.
  • To determine if article type, object transportability, or animate subjects affect mental model organization.

Main Methods:

  • Six experiments were conducted to test organization preferences.
  • Manipulated factors included article type, object transportability, and sentence subject (animate vs. inanimate).
  • Utilized specific locations (e.g., phone booth) to influence organization plausibility.

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Main Results:

  • Article type and object transportability did not impact location-based organization.
  • Animate sentence subjects (people) decreased the preference for location-based organizations.
  • A person-based organization emerged when locations were highly specific to individuals.

Conclusions:

  • Mental model organization is key to understanding the fan effect.
  • The presence of people shifts organization from location-based to person-based.
  • Contextual cues, like single-occupancy locations, can promote person-based organization.