Schedule of Events | Symposia

Acculturation is associated with variation in ERP correlates of self-related memory strategies

Poster Session B - Sunday, March 30, 2025, 8:00 – 10:00 am EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom

Ashley Gilliam¹ (ashleygilliam@brandeis.edu), Angela Gutchess¹, Qihao Xie¹, Apoorva Uppal¹, Zhiyang Sui¹; ¹Brandeis University

Acculturation, or cultural change in individuals through continuous contact between distinct cultural groups, is an important construct to study for understanding the mechanisms behind effects of cultural background, values, and environment on one's thoughts and behaviors. This project focuses on examining the impact of acculturation on cognitive strategy usage, demonstrating that change in acculturation is associated with change in self- and other-referencing strategies in memory among Chinese international students. Questionnaires and the memory task were administered at two time points (~7 months apart) with EEG measured during encoding at time one. The current study replicates behavioral memory effects associated with acculturation. Importantly, it also extends research by examining the relationship between acculturation and ERP components (P300, LFP, LPP) that represent processes associated with cultural memory patterns. In a sample of 56 Chinese students studying in the United States, we found that greater acculturation to the US was associated with a larger behavioral self-reference effect, contrasted by a smaller neural self-reference effect (LFP & LPP). Additionally, greater acculturation was also associated with both a smaller behavioral close other-reference effect and a smaller neural close other-reference effect (LFP & LPP). However, results provide mixed support for the predominantly proposed mechanism of depth of processing, or level of self-relevance, and instead, we posit the potential for level of effortful processing as a mechanism for culture's influence on self-related memory strategies. Future research should further explore these associations, including measuring change in EEG/ERP measures longitudinally over the course of the acculturation process.

Topic Area: LONG-TERM MEMORY: Other