The effect of context variability on source memory

Abstract

High-context-variability (HCV) items are experienced in many more preexperimental semantic contexts than are low-context-variability (LCV) items. LCV confers an advantage to recognition memory (Steyvers & Malmberg, 2003). In the present study, we tested whether or not that advantage could be caused by enhanced source memory. Both context variability and word frequency were manipulated, and both factors generally affected source monitoring. Accuracy was better for LCV items than for HCV items and better for low- than for high-word-frequency items. We also considered whether context variability exerts its influence at encoding or at retrieval. We concluded that better recognition memory for LCV items was due, in part, to better retrieval of contextual details that specify how an item was originally studied. Copyright 2006 Psychonomic Society, Inc.