Distinguishing true from false memories via lexical decision as a perceptual implicit test

Abstract

Studying a list of associated words (holiday, beach, sun, etc.) produces true memory for on-list items (beach), but also false memory for a nonpresented lure (vacation). I suggest that, because only the true item has been physically presented, true and false memories should be distinguishable if the retrieval task accesses purely perceptual information. This is supported using lexical decision as a perceptual implicit test: at a 3-10 min delay, repetition priming was found for physically-presented targets, but there was no semantic priming for lures. This was despite strong false memories for lures in explicit recognition. Given previous findings of lure priming in stem-completion, I argue that to avoid false memories the task must be perceptual, implicit, and produce fast responses.