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Registered Reports and Replications

Emotional context effects on memory accuracy for neutral information

ORCID Icon, & ORCID Icon
Pages 774-789 | Received 02 Oct 2018, Accepted 07 Jan 2021, Published online: 20 Jan 2021
 

ABSTRACT

Despite decades of study, it remains unclear how emotional contexts influence memory for non-emotional information. In two studies, we previously found memory accuracy for neutral information encoded in an emotional context differed by valence. Specifically, neutral images encoded in a negative context were remembered with similar accuracy as those encoded in a non-emotional context, and neutral images encoded in a positive context were remembered with less accuracy than a non-emotional context. This Registered Report contains a third study to replicate our original results and allow for direct comparison between the negative and positive encoding conditions. People in the positive condition showed decreased memory accuracy, but this effect was very small in size and only significant when compared to the neutral condition. Given the lack of difference between negative and neutral conditions, effects of emotion on memory are not only a function of emotional arousal. At the same time, given the nonsignificant, small difference between positive and negative conditions, effects of emotion on memory are also not solely attributable to valence. This series of studies represents a step towards re-examining the tenet that emotion enhances memory unless the experience elicits sufficiently high arousal levels such that memory is impaired.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Target images (IAPS; 2032, 2383, 2377, 2411, 2480). Neutral encoding images (IAPS; 2026, 2279, 2745.1). Negative encoding images (IAPS; 9905, 9920, 3400, 3225, 3181, 9220). Because normative ratings for the images selected from the Internet search were not available, we used participant ratings in the following analyses.

2 Target images (IAPS; 2032, 2383, 2377, 2411, 2480). Neutral encoding images (IAPS; 2026, 2279, 2745.1), Positive encoding images (IAPS; 2360, 2091, 8492, 2388, 2070, 7325).

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