Types of forgetting and explanation of forgetting

• what are the reasons for forgetting?

  ->proactive interference

  ->retroactive interference

  ->retrieval failure

  ->absence of cues
• what is forgetting caused by

  ->interference theories suggest that forgetting is caused by competing memories, either because existing memories interfere with the learning of the new info (proactive interference)

  ->or new info interferes with previously learnt info (retroactive interference)

  ->it can also occur because info cannot be retrieved, due to insufficient cues to trigger memory
• case study- Muller and Pilzecker (1900)


  ->procedure: participants were given a list of syllables to learn for 6 minutes.

  ->there was then a short wait between the participants were asked to recall the list

  ->some participants were given an extra task during this waiting time which was to look at three landscape paintings and describe them

  ->findings: participants who were given the extra task (landscapes) were not as good at recalling their list of syllables compared to those who did nothing during the waiting time
• case study: Keppel and Underwood (1962)


  ->aim: was to investigate the effect of proactive interference on LTM

  ->method: in an experiment that is very similar to that conducted by Peterson and Peterson (1959) participants were presented with meaningless three-letter consonant trigrams (e.g, THG) at different intervals (3,6,9 seconds).

  ->to prevent rehearsal, the participants had to count backwards in threes before recalling
• what were the results and conclusion of the Keppel and Underwood case study?


  ->results: participants typically remembered the trigrams that were presented first, irrespective of the interval length

  ->conclusion: the results suggest proactive interference occurred, as memory for the earlier consonants (which had transferred to LTM) interfered with the memory for new consonants, due to the similarity of the info presented
• case study- Baddeley and Hitch (1977)


  ->aim: to investigate retroactive interference in everyday memory

  ->method: the sample comprised rugby union players who had played every match in the season and players who had missed some games due to injury

  ->the length of time from the start to the end of the season was the same for all players, and players were asked to recall the names of the teams they had played against earlier in the season
• what was the results and conclusions for the Baddeley and Hitch case study


  ->results: the players who had played the most games forgot proportionately more games than those who had played fewer games due to injury

  ->conclusion: Baddeley and Hitch concluded that this was the result of retroactive interference as the learning of new info (new team names) interfered with the memory of old info (earlier team names)
• what is a strength of the studies done around the types of forgetting?


  -> there is supporting evidence from lab experiments

  ->Keppel and Underwood

  ->this supports interference as an explanation of forgetting; as lab experiments are highly controlled, we can be more confident that this is a valid explanation
• what is a weakness of these studies done?

  ->the supporting evidence lacks ecological validity

  -> Miller and Pilzecker (example)

  ->this is a weakness because this lab experiment was controlled unlike in real life where certain things can be controlled. Also, these tasks cannot be done in everyday life
• what is another strength surrounding the supporting evidence done on the types of forgetting

  ->other supporting research has found interference in everyday situations

  ->Baddeley and Hitch case study done on rugby union players

  ->this is a strength because it shows that retroactive interference can be applied to some every day situations
• what is another reason or forgetting?

  insufficient cues causing retrieval failure
• what is the encoding specificity principle?


  ->it was proposed by Tulving and Thomson in 1973

  ->they argued that memory is most effective when info that was present at the time of coding is also present at the time of retrieval

  ->they suggested that environmental cues and mental cues aid recall
• what are environmental and mental cues?


  ->environmental cues: include the room in which you learn info

  ->mental cues: includes your emotional state
• what are the two types of retrieval failure due to absence of cues?


  ->context-dependent failure

  ->state-dependent failure
• explain context-dependent and state-dependent failure

  it occurs when environmental cues are missing and state-dependent failure occurs when an individual's emotional state is different when trying to recall info
• give a study/experiment (context-dependent failure)


  ->18 participants (13M and 5F) from a university diving club, who were divided into four conditions :

  learning words on land & recalling on land

  learning words on land & recalling underwater

  learning underwater & recalling underwater

  learning underwater & recalling on land

  ->the experiment was repeated with each participant taking part in all four conditions, over four separate days ->participants were given 38 words, which they heard twice

  ->after they were instructed to write all the words they could remember, in any order
• what was the aim of this experiment/case study (Godden and Baddeley)


  to investigate the effect of contextual cues on recall (in essence, would memory for words learned and recalled in the same environment be better than memory for words learned and recalled in different environments?)
• what were results and conclusion of the case study (Godden and Baddeley)


  ->results: the words learned underwater were better recalled underwater and words learned on land were better recalled on land

  ->conclusion: it is, therefore, reasonable to conclude that the environmental cues (context) improve recall
• what is a strength of the studies around forgetting to figure out why were forget things?

  ->there is supporting evidence for retrieval failure as an explanation for forgetting

  ->Godden and Baddeley (1975) investigated whether context related cues affect recall and found that participants recalled info better when they were asked to recall it in the same environment which they learnt it

  ->this increases the validity of the theory as it suggests that we do experience RF(retrieval failure) and forget things when there is an absence of environmental cues
• what is a limitation on these studies done to work out the reasons we forget things?

  ->Baddeley (1997) argued that the absence of context related cues doesn't have a strong effect on our ability to recall information

  ->this is because in real life, most contexts were not drastically different from one another

  ->in G&B's (1975) study, the two environments (land&water) were very different, but in normal situations; this would not be the case

  ->this decreases the validity of the theory because we cannot confidently say that the finding of the study would be replicated in real life scenarios
• what is a strength of the studies done to work out the reasons we forget things 


  ->another strength of the theory is that it has useful real-life applications

  ->students and schools can be benefit from understanding how the absence of environmental cues affect our ability to recall info

  ->for example, exam results maybe improved by having students take test/exams in the same place they learnt the info

  ->this is useful because students are able to forget better & improved grades