Wilton Richard N
Department of Psychology, Dundee University, UK.
Memory. 2006 Feb;14(2):214-31. doi: 10.1080/09658210500158572.
Previous studies have shown that the cued recall of paired associates is greater when one member of a pair has been apprehended as lying on the other member, as compared with the two having been apprehended as independent objects. The effect occurs when the objects have been perceived, imagined, or described in the relevant relationship. The additional thoughts hypothesis postulates that participants have more spontaneous "additional thoughts" when apprehending a pair in the relational condition. These may provide additional retrieval routes, thereby explaining the effect. In four experiments, the hypothesis was tested under conditions in which a clear unambiguous definition could be specified for an additional thought. The results showed that the greater recall in an "on" condition, as compared with an independent condition, occurs at least in part because more additional thoughts occur in the "on" condition. There was no evidence for any other contribution to the effect. It is argued that the findings question whether relations between objects play a fundamental role in the structure of memory.
先前的研究表明，与将一对事物中的两个当作独立对象来认知相比，当其中一个事物被认知为位于另一个事物之上时，对配对联想的线索回忆效果更佳。当这些事物在相关关系中被感知、想象或描述时，这种效果就会出现。额外思维假设认为，参与者在以相关关系认知一对事物时会产生更多自发的“额外思维”。这些额外思维可能会提供更多的检索途径，从而解释了这种效果。在四项实验中，该假设在能够为额外思维明确界定清晰定义的条件下得到了检验。结果表明，与独立条件相比，“在上”条件下的回忆效果更佳，至少部分原因是“在上”条件下会产生更多的额外思维。没有证据表明存在其他对这种效果有贡献的因素。有人认为，这些发现对物体之间的关系在记忆结构中是否起基本作用提出了质疑。
