EXACT AND CONCEPTUAL REPETITION DISSOCIATE CONCEPTUAL MEMORY TESTS - PROBLEMS FOR TRANSFER APPROPRIATE PROCESSING THEORY

Three experiments examined whether a conceptual implicit memory test ( specifically, category instance generation) would exhibit repetition e ffects similar to those found in free recall. The transfer appropriate processing account of dissociations among memory tests led us to pred ict that the tests would show parallel effects; this prediction was ba sed upon the theory's assumption that conceptual tests will behave sim ilarly as a function of various independent variables. In Experiment 1 , conceptual repetition (i.e., following a target word [e.g., puzzles] with an associate [e.g., jigsaw]) did not enhance priming on the inst ance generation test relative to the condition of simply presenting th e target word once, although this manipulation did affect free recall. In Experiment 2, conceptual repetition was achieved by following a pi cture with its corresponding word (or vice versa). In this case, there was an effect of conceptual repetition on free recall but no reliable effect on category instance generation or category cued recall. In ad dition, we obtained a picture superiority effect in free recall but no t in category instance generation. In the third experiment, when the s ame study sequence was used as in Experiment 1, but with instructions that encouraged relational processing, priming on the category instanc e generation task was enhanced by conceptual repetition. Results demon strate that conceptual memory tests can be dissociated and present pro blems for Roediger's (1990) transfer appropriate processing account of dissociations between explicit and implicit tests.