The effect of general knowledge on source memory and decision processes

Two experiments explored how semantic information affects episodic source decisions. Fictitious sources presented statements consistent with their respective professions, consistent with the other source’s profession, and neutral with respect to either profession. Knowledge of the professions was manipulated as being available during encoding and retrieval, during retrieval only, or not at all. Source decisions for profession-related statements were biased by knowledge of the sourcesʹ professions only in the retrieval schema condition. Knowledge of the sourcesʹ professions at encoding actually prevented reliance on profession schemas, resulting in no bias at test. Experiment 2 demonstrated further that the response bias was not due simply to subjective guessing, but was in fact more prominent in higher levels of confidence associated with source decisions. We discuss the implications of these results for the manner in which general semantic knowledge affects source memory and decision processes.