  In source memory studies, a decision-maker is concerned with identifying the
context in which a given episodic experience occurred. A common paradigm for
studying source memory is the `three-list' experimental paradigm, where a
subject studies three lists of words and is later asked whether a given word
appeared on one or more of the studied lists. Surprisingly, the sum total of
the acceptance probabilities generated by asking for the source of a word
separately for each list (`list 1?', `list 2?', `list 3?') exceeds the
acceptance probability generated by asking whether that word occurred on the
union of the lists (`list 1 or 2 or 3?'). The episodic memory for a given word
therefore appears over distributed on the disjoint contexts of the lists. A
quantum episodic memory model [QEM] was proposed by Brainerd, Wang and Reyna
(2013) to explain this type of result. In this paper, we apply a Hamiltonian
dynamical extension of QEM for over distribution of source memory. The
Hamiltonian operators are simultaneously driven by parameters for re-allocation
of gist-based and verbatim-based acceptance support as subjects are exposed to
the cue word in the first temporal stage, and are attenuated for
description-dependence by the querying probe in the second temporal stage.
Overall, the model predicts well the choice proportions in both separate list
and union list queries and the over distribution effect, suggesting that a
Hamiltonian dynamics for QEM can provide a good account of the acceptance
processes involved in episodic memory tasks.
