Middlebrooks Catherine D, Murayama Kou, Castel Alan D
University of California, Los Angeles, United States.
University of Reading, UK; Kochi University of Technology, Japan.
Acta Psychol (Amst). 2016 Oct;170:1-9. doi: 10.1016/j.actpsy.2016.06.001. Epub 2016 Jun 12.
While being short on time can certainly limit what one remembers, are there always such costs? The current study investigates the impact of time constraints on selective memory and the self-regulated study of valuable information. Participants studied lists of words ranging in value from 1-10 points, with the goal being to maximize their score during recall. Half of the participants studied these words at a constant presentation rate of either 1 s or 5s. The other half of participants studied under both rates, either fast (1s) during the first several lists and then slow (5s) during later lists, or vice versa. Study was then self-paced during a final segment of lists for all participants to determine how people regulate their study time after experiencing different presentation rates during study. While participants recalled more words overall when studying at a 5-second rate, there were no significant differences in terms of value-based recall, with all participants demonstrating better recall for higher-valued words and similar patterns of selectivity, regardless of study time or prior timing experience. Self-paced study was also value-based, with participants spending more time studying high-value words than low-value. Thus, while being short on time may have impaired memory overall, participants' attention to item value during study was not differentially impacted by the fast and slow timing rates. Overall, these findings offer further insight regarding the influence that timing schedules and task experience have on how people selectively focus on valuable information.
虽然时间紧迫肯定会限制一个人的记忆，但是否总是存在这样的代价呢？当前的研究调查了时间限制对选择性记忆和有价值信息的自我调节学习的影响。参与者学习了价值从1到10分不等的单词列表，目标是在回忆时最大化他们的分数。一半的参与者以1秒或5秒的恒定呈现速度学习这些单词。另一半参与者在两种速度下学习，要么在前几个列表中快速（1秒）学习，然后在后面的列表中慢速（5秒）学习，反之亦然。然后在所有参与者的最后一部分列表学习中让他们自主调节速度，以确定人们在经历了不同的呈现速度后如何调节他们的学习时间。虽然参与者以5秒的速度学习时总体上回忆起的单词更多，但在基于价值的回忆方面没有显著差异，所有参与者对高价值单词的回忆都更好，并且具有相似的选择性模式，无论学习时间或之前的计时经验如何。自主调节学习也是基于价值的，参与者花更多时间学习高价值单词而不是低价值单词。因此，虽然时间紧迫可能总体上损害了记忆，但参与者在学习过程中对项目价值的关注并没有受到快速和慢速计时速度的不同影响。总体而言，这些发现为计时安排和任务经验对人们如何有选择地关注有价值信息的影响提供了进一步的见解。
