RECEIVER-OPERATING CHARACTERISTICS IN RECOGNITION MEMORY - EVIDENCE FOR A DUAL-PROCESS MODEL

Evidence is presented that recognition judgments are based on an asses sment of familiarity, as is described by signal detection theory, but that a separate recollection process also contributes to performance. In 3 receiver-operating characteristics (ROC) experiments, the process dissociation procedure was used to examine the contribution of these processes to recognition memory. In Experiments 1 and 2, reducing the length of the study list increased the intercept (d') but decreased th e slope of the ROC and increased the probability of recollection but l eft familiarity relatively unaffected. In Experiment 3, increasing stu dy time increased the intercept but left the slope of the ROC unaffect ed and increased both recollection and familiarity. In all 3 experimen ts, judgments based on familiarity produced a symmetrical ROC (slope = 1), but recollection introduced a skew such that the slope of the ROC decreased.