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Abstract:
Event related brain potential (ERP) research has made
significant progress toward the understanding of the nature of
initial encoding of information that is consequential for memory
performance. Specifically, a positive going ERP component,
corresponding to P300, and the late positive component (LPC) were
evident during encoding in free recall paradigms (Karis, Fabiani,
& Donchin, 1894). However, memory-related ERP processing
occurring beyond the first second after stimulus presentation has
not yet been found to be associated with later recall. In this
study, we examined whether the slow wave (SW) ERP component
amplitude is related to subsequent performance in a free-recall
task. Participants were presented five blocks of 18 words each.
After each block, participants were asked to recall as many words
as they could. EEG was recorded during encoding using a 9-site EEG
cap. ERP waveforms were obtained by separately averaging epochs for
words that were later recalled and words that were later forgotten.
Utilizing Principal Component Analysis, we identified two SW
components (early: 870 1850, and late: 1850 3500 ms). We found a
significant Memory x Component interaction (F(1,13) = 7.09, p <
.05), which indicated that the late SW component was related to
memory performance as indexed by a larger SW amplitude to
remembered than forgotten words. Thus, we were able to provide
evidence that SW amplitude is related to subsequent performance on
a free-recall task.
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