Date of Award

6-2012

Document Type

Open Access

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Daniel Burns

Language

English

Keywords

survival, ancestors, recall, effects, study

Abstract

When primed to think about one’s survival, participants experience an increase in recall for a set of words. This result called the ‘survival processing effect’ was initially found for participants primed to think about their survival in an ancestral environment. The present study was designed to access whether the effect could be replicated in non-ancestral scenarios. Analyses showed that the effect could be replicated and that non-ancestral scenarios even led to a slightly higher level of recall than the traditional ancestral scenario. Various characteristics of the modern scenarios are believed to have been responsible for this finding including an increase in familiarity and fear, as well as a higher degree of media attention. This study helps to broaden the robustness of the original findings on the survival processing effect.

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