The effects of handedness and bilateral saccadic eye movements on false alarms in recognition memory

Handedness can be used as a marker for interhemispheric interaction, which can produce memory benefits. Bilateral saccadic eye movements can be used to manipulate levels of interhemispheric interaction. This study measured the effects of handedness and bilateral saccadic eye movement on memory using the Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm. This study predicted a memory advantage for left-handers and mixed-handers without eye movements and an advantage for right-handers with the eye movements. The results do not support these predictions but do suggest that handedness is a factor in episodic memory performance. The analyses for this study were run using A’ to compare false alarm rates for critical lures and for unrelated new items. Mixed-handers were less susceptible to the DRM paradigm, as the made fewer critical false alarms than both left-handers and right-handers. The bilateral saccadic eye movements increased the number of critical false alarms for left-handers but did not affect righthanders or mixed-handers. Reaction times data indicated that participants treated critical lures like old items.

Dissertation/Thesis

English

Lisa Weinberg

Weinberg, L. (2010). The effects of handedness and bilateral saccadic eye movements on false alarms in recognition memory. (Honors Project, Macalester College). Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=psychology_honors