Anticipation of novel environments enhances memory for incidental information
- Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre (CUBRIC), School of Psychology, Cardiff University, Wales CF24 4HQ, United Kingdom
- Corresponding author: gruberm{at}cardiff.ac.uk
Abstract
Novelty is a potent driver of learning, but little is known about whether anticipation of novelty can enhance memory for incidental information. Here, participants incidentally encountered objects while they actively navigated toward novel or previously familiarized virtual rooms. Across immediate and delayed surprise memory tests, participants showed superior recollection for incidental objects encountered while anticipating novel as compared with familiarized rooms. Furthermore, memory for incidental objects correlated positively with between-participants average curiosity about novel rooms but negatively with within-participants trial-specific curiosity. Our findings contribute to the growing literature on how salient processes impact memory for incidental material.
Footnotes
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[Supplemental material is available for this article.]
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Article is online at http://www.learnmem.org/cgi/doi/10.1101/lm.053392.121.
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Freely available online through the Learning & Memory Open Access option.
- Received January 13, 2021.
- Accepted June 21, 2021.
This article, published in Learning & Memory, is available under a Creative Commons License (Attribution 4.0 International), as described at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
