Decision processes in recognition memory: Criterion shifts and the list-strength paradigm.

Abstract

This article focuses on decision processes in recognition memory. It begins with investigation of the hypothesis that the measured criterion increases systematically with the memorability of old items. Three experiments using the list-strength paradigm, and a review of the prior literature, present results consistent with this hypothesis. Several psychological models of criterion placement are examined, generating different predictions about the relative sizes of criterion shifts for strong and weak items. A range model, in which criterion placement depends on the estimated range of the old and new distributions, predicts that criterion shifts should be larger for weak items; this result emerges in a reanalysis of prior studies. The general discussion elaborates on how a focus on criterion placement can explain the mirror effect (Glanzer, Adams, Iverson, & Kim, 1993) and provides a framework for testing Shiffrin, Ratcliff, and Clark's (1990) claims about why null effects of list strength occur with repetition.