Consolidation power of extrinsic rewards: reward cues enhance long-term memory for irrelevant past events

Murayama, K. and Kitagami, S. (2014) Consolidation power of extrinsic rewards: reward cues enhance long-term memory for irrelevant past events. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143 (1). pp. 15-20. ISSN 1939-2222 doi: 10.1037/a0031992

Abstract/Summary

Recent research suggests that extrinsic rewards promote memory consolidation through dopaminergic modulation processes. However, no conclusive behavioral evidence exists given that the influence of extrinsic reward on attention and motivation during encoding and consolidation processes are inherently confounded. The present study provides behavioral evidence that extrinsic rewards (i.e., monetary incentives) enhance human memory consolidation independently of attention and motivation. Participants saw neutral pictures, followed by a reward or control cue in an unrelated context. Our results (and a direct replication study) demonstrated that the reward cue predicted a retrograde enhancement of memory for the preceding neutral pictures. This retrograde effect was observed only after a delay, not immediately upon testing. An additional experiment showed that emotional arousal or unconscious resource mobilization cannot explain the retrograde enhancement effect. These results provide support for the notion that the dopaminergic memory consolidation effect can result from extrinsic reward. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved)(journal abstract)

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/34841
Item Type	Article
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Department of Psychology Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Neuroscience Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Language and Cognition Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Psychopathology and Affective Neuroscience
Uncontrolled Keywords	Human Experimental Psychology
Publisher	American Psychological Association
Publisher Statement	This article may not exactly replicate the final version published in the APA journal. It is not the copy of record.
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