Abstract

Schemas guide comprehension and memory of everyday activities, yet theories differ on how schema‐unexpected or schema‐expected events affect memory. In this study, we compared predictions from the Schema‐Linked Interactions between Medial Prefrontal Cortex and Medial Temporal Lobe (SLIMM) model, which proposes a U‐shaped function for gist memory (both highly expected and highly unexpected events are well remembered) and a linear function for detailed memory, with those of the Schema Copy Plus Tag (SC+T) theory, which proposes a linear function for both gist and detailed memory. Participants read everyday activity narratives with events varying in surprisal, prediction uncertainty, and relevance to goals. Memory was tested after 30-minute and 24-hour delays. We found that gist memory discrimination increased linearly with surprisal, favoring SC+T. Unexpected events yielded fewer false alarms, suggesting that their memory discrimination stems partly from reduced confusion at retrieval. Moreover, memory for both expected and unexpected events decayed at similar rates over 24 hours, aligning with SC+T’s prediction rather than SLIMM’s proposal that memory for expected events decays at a slower rate than memory for unexpected events does. In addition to surprisal, we examined the role of prediction uncertainty—moments when observers could not confidently forecast upcoming actions—on memory. Gist memory was higher for events that followed high‐uncertainty segments, consistent with the hypothesis that people allocate extra attention when they cannot predict what happens next. Finally, we found that subjective surprise depends strongly on whether an event is inappropriate relative to the schema and is amplified when such violations occur in goal‐relevant actions. These findings suggest humans develop more precise predictions for goal-central aspects of activities, and that humans allocate enhanced attention to moments of high uncertainty or high surprisal, optimizing the encoding of everyday experiences.

Committee Chair

Jeffrey Zacks

Committee Members

Ian Dobbins; Jeffrey Zacks; Ken McRae; Mike Strube; Zachariah Reagh

Degree

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Author's Department

Psychology

Author's School

Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

Document Type

Dissertation

Date of Award

5-2-2025

Language

English (en)

Author's ORCID

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8433-4678

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