abstract Christoph Weidemann

Christoph Weidemann (Swansea University and the University of Pennsylvania, USA)

The dynamics of recognition memory: Insights from response times and brain activity

Decades of research on recognition memory has given us great insights into the underlying processes and features of stimuli and tasks that improve or impair performance. However relatively little is known about how the signal on which memory decisions are based evolves across a recognition memory trial. Despite well-known issues with introspective judgments, most studies attempting to measure "memory strength" rely on confidence ratings at or after the classification of an item as "old" or "new". I will show that much of information in confidence ratings can be obtained from response times. Furthermore, I will show how evidence distinguishing targets from lures steadily accumulates during the recognition test by applying machine learning techniques to EEG data. Implications of this approach for the study of recognition memory and other classification tasks are discussed.