Memory for psychophysical scaling judgments

In three experiments, we examined memory for responses and stimuli experien ced in a single direct psychophysical scaling session in which subjects mad e absolute magnitude estimations of the loudnesses of pure tones. Recall of scaling responses was found to be accurate for the softest and loudest sti muli, but systematically greater than actual-judgments for the intermediate stimulus amplitudes, yielding distorted psychophysical functions for the r ecall data which nonetheless had the same power function exponent as that f or the judged stimuli. Also, memory for the range of stimulus amplitudes wa s fairly accurate, but subjects could not distinguish between judged and no njudged amplitudes within that range. The results are consistent with the r ole of extreme stimuli as anchors for judgment, and indicate that memories for these stimuli and responses made to them can be expected to influence f uture scaling judgments. These results also are consistent with the uncerta inty hypothesis of mnemophysics.