A behavioral experiment collected participant responses during a 3-minute category fluency task where they retrieved animal names from memory. The data was analyzed using the BEAGLE semantic memory model on a Wikipedia corpus and hand-coded categories from Troyer et al. (1997). The study, authored by Thomas T. Hills of the University of Basel, investigates if human memory search follows optimal foraging policies observed in animals.
Use Cases
- Modeling human memory search policies based on semantic similarity and item frequency
- Testing predictions of optimal foraging theory in a cognitive domain
- Analyzing the structure of semantic memory patches and transition behaviors
Strengths
- Data is grounded in a specific 3-minute behavioral task with defined constraints
- Analysis integrates two methods: an automatic Wikipedia corpus analysis and hand-coded category membership
- Findings are linked to established theoretical frameworks (optimal foraging theory, BEAGLE model)
Limitations
- Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment
Provenance
- Source
- University of Basel
- Collection Method
- Behavioral experiment (category fluency task) combined with corpus analysis.