Toward an understanding of motivational influences on prospective memory using value-added intentions

Cook, Gabriel I.; Rummel, Jan; Dummel, Sebastian · 2015 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2015.00278

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Summary

This study investigates how motivational incentives, specifically monetary gains and losses, influence prospective memory (PM)—the ability to remember to perform an intended action in the future. While previous research on motivational effects on PM yielded mixed results, particularly regarding healthy populations, this research aims to clarify whether adding value to an intention through financial contingencies improves performance. The authors introduce the concept of "value-added intentions," where the fulfillment or failure of an intention is tied to tangible consequences, such as monetary rewards or penalties. The study tests whether these value frames improve PM performance and examines the underlying cognitive mechanisms, specifically whether improvements stem from increased attentional monitoring or more efficient, spontaneous retrieval processes. The researchers conducted two experiments using a standard laboratory PM task embedded within an ongoing lexical-decision task. Participants were assigned to different conditions based on monetary contingencies: a loss-frame condition, where participants lost a portion of their starting payment for each missed PM cue; a gain-frame condition, where participants earned rewards for correct responses; and a no-frame control condition with no monetary consequences. In Experiment 1, the study compared the loss-frame against the no-frame control. Experiment 2 expanded the design to include the gain-frame condition. Performance was measured by the proportion of correct responses to PM cues and by the interference caused to the ongoing task, which served as an indicator of attentional resource allocation. The results demonstrated that value-added intentions significantly improved PM performance. In both Experiment 1 and Experiment 2, participants in the loss-frame condition performed better than those in the no-frame control condition. Additionally, Experiment 2 found that participants in the gain-frame condition also outperformed the control group. Crucially, these improvements in PM accuracy were not accompanied by a significant increase in interference with the ongoing task. This lack of increased cost to the ongoing task suggests that the motivational incentives did not lead to greater effortful attentional monitoring. Instead, the findings imply that the value associated with the intentions facilitated more efficient processing, likely through enhanced spontaneous retrieval or better encoding strategies, rather than through increased attentional effort. These findings provide empirical support for the goal-based motivational-cognitive model of prospective memory, suggesting that personal relevance and value can enhance intention fulfillment without necessarily increasing cognitive load. The study highlights that both the threat of loss and the promise of gain can effectively motivate better PM performance in healthy individuals. This has practical implications for designing interventions to improve memory in everyday contexts, such as financial deadlines or health reminders, by leveraging monetary or other value-based incentives. Theoretically, the results clarify that motivational benefits in PM may operate through mechanisms that automate or facilitate retrieval, distinguishing them from strategies that rely on sustained attentional control.

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• prospective memory interruptions