The Animacy Effect On Judgments Of Learning

Several lines of evidence suggest that the animacy quality of materials plays an important role in visual, attentional and linguistic processing (Caramazza & Mahon, 2003; New, Cosmides, & Tooby,2007; Pratt, Radulescu, Guo, & Abrams,2010). Recent research by Nairne, VanArsdall, Pandeirada, Cogdill, and Le Breton (2013) has demonstrated that animacy is also a critical mnemonic dimension and animate words are remembered better than inanimate words, which refer to as the animacy effect (see also Bonin, Gelin, & Bugaiska,2014; VanArsdall, Nairne, Pandeirada, & Blunt,2013; VanArsdall, Nairne, Pandeirada, & Cogdill,2014). Given that animacy plays a role in these basic cognitive processes, it may also affect higher order cognitive process-metamemory (e.g. Palmore, Garcia, Bacon, Johnson, & Kelemen,2012). Researchers have documented a variety of cues and heuristics that people use to make memory monitoring (Bjork, Dunlosky, & Kornell,2013, for a review). However, little research has examined the role that animacy plays in metamemory. Investigation of animacy effect on metamemory can contribute to our understanding of how people monitor and regulate their own learning and could potentially provide evidence supporting the idea that animacy plays a role in higher cognitive process.Following Koriat’s (1997) cue-utilization framework, we propose that people’s ability to monitor their learning of animate versus inanimate material might depend upon two factors:processing fluency and beliefs about memory. The current study investigates the role of animacy in memory monitoring. Using Chinese animate or inanimate words, our main goal was to examine whether animacy influences predictions. To foreshadow, we found an effect of animacy on JOLs in Experiment 1, and therefore, a second goal of the study was to try to understand how this cue might inform predictions. Specifically, In Experiment 2, we investigated the possibility that processing fluency, as measured by study time mediates the relationship between animacy and JOLs. In Experiment 3, we changed our focus to examine whether people have a belief about animacy. To do so, a questionnaire was designed; participants read a description of an experiment and predict recall performance for animate and inanimate words without actually having the experience that participants in the actual experiment have.The results from the recall performance of Experiment 1 replicated the findings of previous studies (Bonin et al.,2014; Nairne et al.,2013; VanArsdall et al.,2013; VanArsdall et al.,2014) and expanded to Chinese words. More critically, animacy was used as a cue for metamemory judgments, with particpants assigning higher JOLs for animate than inanimate words. The self-paced study time in Experiment 2 revealed no difference between animate and inanimate, suggests that processing fluency plays a minimal role in the animacy effect on JOLs. The predictions in Experiment 3 revealed that particpants gave higher estimates for animate words than inanimate words, suggests that people have a priori beliefs about an effect of animacy on memory and therefore indicates that the results of Experiments 1 and 2 were driven by such beliefs.Conclusions were as follows:(1) Animate words are remembered better than inanimate words, which refer to as the animacy effect.(2) Animacy was used as a cue for metamemory judgments, with participants assigning higher JOLs for animate than inanimate words.(3) Beliefs but not processing fluency contributes substantially to the animacy effect on JOLs.