Pérez Cubillas, C. & Vadillo, M. A.
Universidad de Deusto
Information-retrieval effects, such as renewal, reinstatement or spontaneous recovery are well-studied phenomena in the literature on human and non-human learning. These effects consist of the retrieval of first learned information after an interference treatment (e.g., X+ trials followed by X- trials). Within this framework, context change (either physical, associative or temporal) is considered responsible for the retrieval of the first- or the second-learned association. But what is a context change? The context is usually defined as set of constant, nonsalient and nonpredictive stimuli. We conducted three experiments showing that the absence of an expected cue can have similar effects as a context switch. In these experiments, a cue received an overshadowed treatment (AX+) in a first phase. After that, in a second phase, these cues were paired with a different consequence (AX-). In the test phase, only one of the cues (X) was presented. This variation in the presentation of the cue lead participants to partially retrieve the first-learned association, showing an intermediate level of responding to cue X. None of the theories that are usually invoked in the literature to account for information retrieval can explain this data satisfactorily.