How do people recognize objects they have encountered previously? Cognitive models of recognition memory aim to explain overt behavior using latent psychological processes, such as true recognition and pure guessing. Validation studies assess whether the mechanisms underlying cognitive models properly reflect the psychological processes they aim to explain. The present study provides such a validation study for models describing paired-word recognition—a paradigm in which participants have to categorize randomly constructed word pairs. Specifically, introducing a strength manipulation (Experiment 1), presenting certain words more often during study, a base-rate manipulation of response categories (Experiment 2), presenting certain pair types more often during test, a base-rate manipulation of overall frequencies of old and new words (Experiment 3), and a payoff manipulation, differentially incentivizing correct responses (Experiment 4), we assessed the validity of general recognition theory, a multidimensional signal detection theory model, and the paired two-high threshold model, a discrete-state model. Both models captured the strength manipulation as expected on mnemonic parameters describing memory sensitivity and detection probability. Unexpectedly, the base-rate and payoff manipulations affected (strategic) memory retrieval within the discrete-state model (Experiments 2–4) and both strategic retrieval (Experiment 2) and decision boundaries (Experiments 3 and 4) within the continuous model. Implications for model validity and the future use of these models for paired-word recognition are discussed.
