Biomaterial Database

Why do strangers feel familiar, but friends don't? A discrepancy-attribution account of feelings of familiarity. 1998

B W Whittlesea, and L D Williams

Department of Psychology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada.

Recent articles on familiarity (e.g. Whittlesea, B.W.A, 1993. Journal of Experimental Psychology 19, 1235) have argued that the feeling of familiarity is produced by unconscious attribution of fluent processing to a source in the past. In this article, we refine that notion: We argue that is not fluency per se, but rather fluent processing occurring under unexpected circumstances that produces the feeling. We demonstrate cases in which moderately fluent processing produces more familiarity than does highly fluent processing, at least when the former is surprising.

UI	MeSH Term	Description	Entries
D008568	Memory	Complex mental function having four distinct phases: (1) memorizing or learning, (2) retention, (3) recall, and (4) recognition. Clinically, it is usually subdivided into immediate, recent, and remote memory.
D010465	Perception	The process by which the nature and meaning of sensory stimuli are recognized and interpreted.	Sensory Processing,Processing, Sensory
D011930	Reaction Time	The time from the onset of a stimulus until a response is observed.	Response Latency,Response Speed,Response Time,Latency, Response,Reaction Times,Response Latencies,Response Times,Speed, Response,Speeds, Response
D001955	British Columbia	A province of Canada on the Pacific coast. Its capital is Victoria. The name given in 1858 derives from the Columbia River which was named by the American captain Robert Gray for his ship Columbia which in turn was named for Columbus. (From Webster's New Geographical Dictionary, 1988, p178 & Room, Brewer's Dictionary of Names, 1992, p81-2)
D003071	Cognition	Intellectual or mental process whereby an organism obtains knowledge.	Cognitive Function,Cognitions,Cognitive Functions,Function, Cognitive,Functions, Cognitive
D003463	Cues	Signals for an action; that specific portion of a perceptual field or pattern of stimuli to which a subject has learned to respond.	Cue
D006801	Humans	Members of the species Homo sapiens.	Homo sapiens,Man (Taxonomy),Human,Man, Modern,Modern Man
D000704	Analysis of Variance	A statistical technique that isolates and assesses the contributions of categorical independent variables to variation in the mean of a continuous dependent variable.	ANOVA,Analysis, Variance,Variance Analysis,Analyses, Variance,Variance Analyses
D012660	Semantics	The relationships between symbols and their meanings.	Semantic