Do we prioritise memory for cheaters? Rebuttal evidence from old/new effects in episodic memory

Behavioural investigations concerning the influence of cooperation and cheating on the two sub-types of episodic memory (i.e. item memory and source memory), especially on source memory, have shown inconsistent patterns. Besides, the sensitivity of retrieval-relevant neural activities to cooperation and cheating is rarely explored. To delve into these issues, the current study investigated how cooperation and cheating affected old/new effects in item memory and source memory. The results demonstrated that both types of memory elicited four-stage retrieval-relevant processes, indexed by FN400, LPC, LPN, and RFE, respectively. There was moderate to strong evidence that LPC, LPN, and RFE were insusceptible to cooperation and cheating. For the familiarity-based FN400, in item memory, the effect was only identified in the cooperative condition, while in source memory, there was moderate evidence that the effect was comparable between the cooperative and the cheating circumstances. The above data provide no psychophysiological evidence for the cheater-detection strategy.