How does our environment impact what we will later remember? Early work in real-world environments suggested that a matching encoding / retrieval context improves memory. However, some laboratory-based studies have not replicated this advantageous context-dependent memory effect. Using virtual reality methods, we find support for context-dependent memory effects: participants remembered more when placed in the same context as during encoding. This advantage has a tradeoff of falsely ‘recognizing’ similar lures, however. In addition, we find that schema-consistency in terms of the object-environment relationship is beneficial for memory recall, but schema-inconsistency helps recognition. Lastly, we find that differences in the presence (or absence) of dynamic background components differentially elicit the benefits of context-dependent memory. These findings not only add to our understanding of when and how context affects our memory, but they also present an exciting and more naturalistic approach to studying such effects.

Many everyday decisions are based not only on memories ofdirect experiences, but on memories that are integrated acrossmultiple distinct experiences. Sometimes memory integrationbetween existing memories and newly learnt informationoccurs rapidly, without requiring inference during thedecision. It is known that prior knowledge (i.e. schema)affects the initial acquisition, and consolidation, of memories.In this study, we explore the effect of schema on theintegration of acquired memories between paired associates(e.g. integrating A-B and B-C into A-B-C) that were schemaconsistent or inconsistent, as confirmed with a latent semanticanalysis of text corpora. We find that enabling fast learning,by using material that is consistent with a schema, allows forfast memory integration. These behavioral results areconsistent with predictions generated from neuroscientifichypotheses suggesting that an existing schema might enableneocortical learning that is distinct from a more explicithippocampus-mediated integration of new information.