Affiliations 

  • 1 University of Nottingham Malaysia, Malaysia. Electronic address: steve.janssen@nottingham.edu.my
  • 2 University of Nottingham Malaysia, Malaysia
  • 3 University of Nottingham Malaysia, Malaysia; Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
  • 4 University of Tasmania, Australia
Conscious Cogn, 2021 03;89:103089.
PMID: 33607423 DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2021.103089

Abstract

To examine the relationship between visual imagery and autobiographical memory, eye position and pupil size were recorded while participants first searched for memories and then reconstructed the retrieved memories (Experiment 1), or only searched for memories (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, we observed that, although recollective experience was not associated with the number of fixations per minute, memories that took longer to retrieve were linked to increased pupil size. In Experiment 2, we observed that directly retrieved memories were recalled more quickly and were accompanied by smaller pupils than generatively retrieved memories. After correcting for response time, retrieval mode also produced an effect, showing that decreased pupil size is not simply due to directly retrieved memories being recalled more quickly. These findings provide compelling evidence that objective measures, such as pupil size, can be used alongside subjective measures, such as self-reports, to distinguish between directly retrieved and generatively retrieved memories.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.