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Implicit and explicit memory in social tagging: evidence from a process dissociation procedure
Abstract
Motivation -- We analyzed the importance of social tags during an information search in a social software system. In particular, we examined the effects of tags on users' implicit/automatic and explicit/controlled memory processes.
Research approach -- An experiment was conducted in which 48 students took part. By means of process dissociation and a multinomial model we tested our dual-process model (implicit vs. explicit) of social tagging.
Findings/Design -- We conclude that implicit and explicit processes can be dissociated and that tags are important cues during an information search: they leave robust explicit memory representations.
Research limitations/Implications -- A laboratory setting was chosen to care for conclusive findings. Our methods may have to be applied in the natural field to increase external validity.
Originality/Value -- This study directly measures cognitive processes of social tagging and uses an empirical as well as experimental approach to the research questions.
Take away message -- Generative Models of social tagging would benefit from incorporating a dual-process account, where formalizations of signal-detection-theory and markov-models would enable the integration of automatic and controlled processes, respectively.
... A design recommendation of [5] is that teachers or lectors deploying ST for social learning processes should provide a sche- ma for the tagging activity and should categorize tags in a relevant way. In this paper we introduce the principles of a tag-recommendation mechanism (TRM), which is motivated by empirical studies [6,7] and built upon MINERVA 2 [3], a for- mal theory of human memory. This TRM is designed to extract prototypical tag com- binations (so called gist traces) from a user's tagging behavior and to suggest tags in a categorized and psychologically meaningful way. ...
... Cognitive-psychological studies (e.g. [1,6,7]), briefly described in the next sub-section, show that these approaches would benefit from mechanisms applying formal theories of human semantic memory. Such an extension would help to realize the suggestion of [5] to provide a categorical schema for the tagging activity during educational tasks. ...
... They put emphasis on implicit (automatic) categorization processes of a user during a tag-based inference of a resource's gist (topic) as well as during gist-based tag-assignments. By means of a multinomial model of ST [6] and [7] empirically showed that implicit categorization processes (gist-based reconstructions) are indeed in play during the generation of tags. More precisely, users retrieve an implicit gist-trace from their semantic memory to reconstruct the meaning of previously perceived tags. ...
In recent years Social Tagging (ST) has become a popular functionality
in social learning environments, not least because tags support the exchange
of users’ knowledge representations, a process called social sensemaking. An
important design feature of ST-Systems (STS) is the tag recommendation service.
Several principles for tag recommendation mechanisms (TRM) have been
proposed, which are built upon a technical and statistical perspective on STS
and based on aggregated user data on a word level. Up to now, a cognitive perspective
also taking into account memory processes has been neglected. In this
paper we therefore introduce a TRM that applies a formal theory of human
memory to model a user’s prototypical tag configurations. The algorithm underlying
the TRM is supposed to recommend psychologically plausible tag combinations
and to mediate social sensemaking.
Social Tagging is a recent widespread phenomenon on the Web where people assign labels (tags) to Web resources. It has been hypothesized to support collaborative sensemaking. In this paper, we examine some of the cognitive mechanisms assumed to underlie sensemaking, namely social imitation. In line with the semantic imitation model of Fu et al., we assume that implicit processing can be understood as a semantic reconstruction of gist. Our model contrasts this process with a recall of tags from an explicit verbatim memory trace. We tested this model in an experimental study in which after the search task students had to generate tags themselves. We exposed their answers to a multinomial model derived from Fuzzy Trace Theory to obtain independent parameter estimates for the processes of explicit recall, semantic gist reconstruction and familiarity-based recall. A model that assumes all processes are at play explains the data well. Similar to results of our previous study, we find an influence of search intentions on the two processes. Our results have implications for interface and interaction design of social tagging systems, as well as for tag recommendation in these environments.
Seven experiments examined the influence of a memorial text representation on the later reading of a different text (across-text transfer). The texts were related by overlap in vocabulary only, in content only, in both vocabulary and content, or in neither vocabulary nor content. Results indicate that there was facilitation in reading the second text when the two passages were thematically continuous, irrespective of overlap in vocabulary. This facilitation was undiminished over a 15-min delay between the readings of members of the story pair. Overlap in vocabulary between unrelated stories resulted in slower reading of the second story, but this negative transfer was transient. Experiments 5–7 provide a finer grained analysis of the text relatedness effects. The benefits of a memorial representation are interpreted in terms of episodic text representations, rather than abstract schema. Meaning overlap is necessary for such reading facilitation, but context-free word representations play little part in the across-text transfer observed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
In recent literature, several models were proposed for re- producing and understanding the tagging behavior of users. They all assume that the tagging behavior is influenced by the previous tag assignments of other users. But they are only partially successful in reproducing characteristic prop- erties found in tag streams. We argue that this inadequacy of existing models results from their inability to include user's background knowledge into their model of tagging behavior. This paper presents a generative tagging model that integrates both components, the background knowl- edge and the influence of previous tag assignments. Our model successfully reproduces characteristic properties of tag streams. It even explains effects of the user interface on the tag stream.
This chapter explains that multiple systems represent knowledge. It focuses on two resources of knowledge, believed to have strong empirical support - linguistic forms in the brain's language systems, and situated simulations in the brain's modal systems. Although this chapter focuses on two sources of knowledge, it does not exclude the possibility that other types are important as well. It argues that statistical representations play central roles throughout the brain, and that they underlie linguistic forms and situated simulations. It examines linguistic and modal approaches to the representation of knowledge. It proposes the language and situated simulation (LASS) theory as a preliminary framework for integrating these approaches. It then explores the evidence for the LASS theory, including evidence for dual code theory, Glaser's (1922) revision of dual code theory or the lexical hypothesis, evidence from the laboratories.
This research project examined strategies used by indexers in identifying important concepts in scientific books. Indexing consists of employing a controlled terminology to express the important ideas contained in a given document. Twenty indexers of varying types and degrees of expertise indexed four books, noting, first, terms representing the main ideas, and then the indexing terms taken from a documentary language. The indexers not familiar with the content domain of the books identified fewer concepts than the indexers familiar with the domain, and based their judgements on surface-level features of the information. Prior knowledge of the experiment's documentary language guided the choice of some concepts, which could be translated into controlled terms, resulting in more rapid identification. These results showed that identifying important concepts could be due to perceptual processing based on specific cues, as well as conceptual processing based on prior knowledge of the documentary language and the domain to be indexed.
The paper discusses recent developments in web technologies based on collaborative tagging. This approach is seen as a tremendously powerful way to coordinate the ontologies and views of a large number of individuals, thus constituting the most successful tool for distributed cognition so far.
Recent dual-retrieval accounts of free recall postulate that a memory target can be recalled either by directly accessing its verbatim trace or by reconstructing it from semantic or other relational information. We introduce a simple paradigm, derived from the classic Estes RTT procedure, that separates direct access from reconstruction and that separates reconstruction from a metacognitive judgment process that authorizes reconstructed targets for output. Results are reported from four experiments, two that applied the paradigm to free recall and two that extended it to associative recall. The principal findings were that (a) direct access was enhanced by manipulations that made targets' surface forms easier to process or that focused recall on individual targets, (b) reconstruction was enhanced by manipulations that made targets' meaning content easier to process or that focused recall on groups of targets, and (c) such manipulations produced single dissociations, double dissociations, and reversed associations between direct access, reconstruction, and metacognitive judgment. We discuss how this paradigm might be exploited to unify dual-retrieval conceptions of recall and recognition.
To account for dissociations observed in recognition memory tests, several dual-process models have been proposed that assume that recognition judgments can be based on the recollection of details about previous events or on the assessment of stimulus familiarity. In the current article, these models are examined, along with the methods that have been developed to measure recollection and familiarity. The relevant empirical literature from behavioral, neuropsychological, and neuroimaging studies is then reviewed in order to assess model predictions. Results from a variety of measurement methods, including task-dissociation and process-estimation methods, are found to lead to remarkably consistent conclusions about the nature of recollection and familiarity, particularly when ceiling effects are avoided. For example, recollection is found to be more sensitive than familiarity to response speeding, division of attention, generation, semantic encoding, the effects of aging, and the amnestic effects of benzodiazepines, but it is less sensitive than familiarity to shifts in response criterion, fluency manipulations, forgetting over short retention intervals, and some perceptual manipulations. Moreover, neuropsychological and neuroimaging results indicate that the two processes rely on partially distinct neural substrates and provide support for models that assume that recollection relies on the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex, whereas familiarity relies on regions surrounding the hippocampus. Double dissociations produced by experimental manipulations at time of test indicate that the two processes are independent at retrieval, and single dissociations produced by study manipulations indicate that they are partially independent during encoding. Recollection is similar but not identical to free recall, whereas familiarity is similar to conceptual implicit memory, but is dissociable from perceptual implicit memory. Finally, the results indicate that recollection reflects a thresholdlike retrieval process that supports novel learning, whereas familiarity reflects a signal-detection process that can support novel learning only under certain conditions. The results verify a number of model predictions and prove useful in resolving several theoretical disagreements.
This paper begins by considering problems that have plagued investigations of automatic or unconscious influences of perception and memory. A process dissociation procedure that provides an escape from those problems is introduced. The process dissociation procedure separates the contributions of different types of processes to performance of a task, rather than equating processes with tasks. Using that procedure, I provide new evidence in favor of a two-factor theory of recognition memory; one factor relies on automatic processes and the other relies on intentional processes. Recollection (an intentional use of memory) is hampered when attention is divided, rather than full, at the time of test. In contrast, the use of familiarity as a basis for recognition memory judgments (an automatic use of memory) is shown to be invariant across full versus divided attention, manipulated at test. Process dissociation procedures provide a general framework for separating automatic from intentional forms of processing in a variety of domains; including perception, memory, and thought.