"Brown provides a succinct, current, and authoritative overview of the entire empirical literature on this peculiar state of consciousness when a relatively rare word cannot be recalled. ... This empirically driven, functional assessment of this retrieval-failure phenomenon is a welcome addition to the literature on human memory and cognition. It will be of interest to linguists as well as to cognitive psychologists and developmental psychologists. Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty." - G.C. Gamst, University of La Verne, in CHOICE "For scholars interested in a thorough, well-organised, and concise description of what is currently known about the [TOT] phenomenon and how we know it, it is hard to imagine how a more useful resource could have been constructed."- David Kreiner, University of Central Missouri, USA, in PsycCRITIQUES"Everyone has been thwarted by tip of the tongue, but how can such a fleeting subjective phenomenon contribute to scientific knowledge? In this up to date volume, Brown delves into the techniques that cognitive psychologists use to study tip of the tongue states in the lab. Focusing on basic research findings, his comprehensive treatment illustrates the power of experimental psychology to provide new insights into age-old questions, such as how we ‘know that we know’ something, even if we cannot (just yet) think of it. It is a welcome resource for students and scholars of human cognition." - David A. Gallo, Assistant Professor, University of Chicago, and author of Associative Illusions of Memory: False Memory Research in DRM and Related Tasks"Alan Brown has continually shaped the way researchers think about TOTs. Here, Brown has written a well thought out overview of research on the TOT phenomenon. This book will be an indispensible guide to anyone doing or intending to do research in this area. It will shape and guide research on TOTs by establishing common conventions and promoting a new set of research questions. I’ve been researching the TOT phenomenon for over twenty years, but I was challenged to think in new ways by Brown’s book." - Bennett L. Schwartz, Professor of Psychology, Florida International University, and author of Tip-of-the-Tongue States: Phenomenology, Mechanism, and Lexical Retrieval