The effects of distinctiveness on memory and metamemory for face–name associations

Abstract

We examined the influence of face and name distinctiveness on memory and metamemory for face–name associations. Four types of monitoring judgements were solicited during encoding and retrieval of face–name pairs that contained distinct or typical faces (Experiment 1) or names (Experiment 2). The beneficial effects of distinctiveness on associative memory were symmetrical between faces and names, such that relative to their typical counterparts, distinct faces enhanced memory for names, and distinct names enhanced memory for faces. These effects were also apparent in metamemory. Estimates of prospective and retrospective memory performance were greater for face–name associations that contained a distinct face or name compared with a typical face or name, regardless of whether the distinct item was a cue or target. Moreover, the predictive validity of prospective monitoring improved with name distinctiveness, whereas the predictive validity of retrospective monitoring improved with facial distinctiveness. Our results indicate that distinctiveness affects not only the strength of the association between a face and a name, but also the ability to monitor that association.

Keywords:

• Metacognition
• Face identification
• Distinctiveness

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This research was supported by grants from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to N.W. and C.C.

Notes

¹Despite the lack of direct links between names and faces, these models can nevertheless potentially explain distinctiveness effects through cascading activation of units. For instance, in the interactive activation and competition model (Burton et al., 1990) a distinct name would activate fewer person identity nodes (PINs) compared with a typical name. The activation of fewer PINs would decrease the amount of noise in the pool of face recognition units (FRUs), making it easier for the target FRU to reach asymptotic activation.

²The accuracy of a monitoring judgement at predicting memory performance can be determined by calculating the correlation between the magnitude of a judgement and performance on an objective memory test. This correlation is often referred to as relative accuracy or resolution, and is useful for measuring a participant's ability to monitor items on an item-by-item basis (for reviews, see Nelson 1984; Schraw, 2009).

³A by-item analysis was also conducted for both experiments. The results of the by-item analysis, by and large, are identical to the by-participant analysis, but were omitted from the manuscript for the sake of brevity. These data are available upon request from the first author (N.W.).

⁴Recall that, in the face target condition, recall accuracy could not objectively be determined. Consequently statistical analyses involving recall accuracy for the face target condition were not conducted.