The formation of novel social category conjunctions in working memory: A possible role for the episodic buffer?

Abstract

Recent research (e.g., Hutter, Crisp, Humphreys, Waters, & Moffit; Siebler) has confirmed that combining novel social categories involves two stages (e.g., Hampton; Hastie, Schroeder, & Weber). Furthermore, it is also evident that following stage 1 (constituent additivity), the second stage in these models involves cognitively effortful complex reasoning. However, while current theory and research has addressed how category conjunctions are initially represented to some degree, it is not clear precisely where we first combine or bind existing social constituent categories. For example, how and where do we compose and temporarily store a coherent representation of an individual who shares membership of “female” and “blacksmith” categories? In this article, we consider how the revised multi-component model of working memory (Baddeley) can assist in resolving the representational limitations in the extant two-stage theoretical models. This is a new approach to understanding how novel conjunctions form new bound “composite” representations.

Keywords:

• Working memory
• Binding
• Category conjunction
• Impression formation

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

¹ We use the less cumbersome term ‘novel’ henceforth to denote extremely unfamiliar. Familiarity in this manuscript refers to conjunctive familiarity (i.e., female blacksmith) in contrast to constituent familiarity (i.e., female or blacksmith).

² We do not discuss Kunda and Thagard's (1996) Parallel-Constraint-Satisfaction Theory because it requires conjunctive exemplars—something that does not exist in novel conjunctions.

³ It should be noted that Hampton's model is more usually associated with natural category conjunction (cf. social category conjunctions) and is less usually applied to impression formation (see however, Hampton, 1997; Hampton, Dillane, Oren, & Worgan, 2011).

⁴ This ability forms in childhood, indeed, children from approximately seven to eight years old seemingly have a sophisticated understanding of multiple simultaneous categorical memberships (e.g., Cameron, Rutland, & Brown, 2007; Livesley & Bromley, 1973).