Remembered and Perceived Size as a Function of Familiarity

Abstract

Subjects (42 girls 17 or 18 years old) overlearned to different criteria the associations between circles and the symbolic codes that stood for the circles when their areas were assessed from memory. Consistent with the prediction from the uncertainty theory but conflicting with the prediction from the reperception hypothesis, familiarity with the referent stimuli affected the memory-based magnitude judgments. Surprisingly, familiarity also affected perceptual judgments given to the referent circle stimuli. The possibility of discrete, linguistic influences on both perceptual and memory-based processing of sensory reactions is discussed.