interference theory

• proactive interference

  occurs when old information stored in LTM interferes with the learning of new information
• proactive interference key study

  keppel and underwood 1962
• retroactive interference


  occurs when the learning of new information interferes with the recall of old information from LTM
• retroactive interference key study

  baddley and hitch 1977
• proactive interference example 


  when you get a new phone number your memory for your old number will author your attempts to remember your new number
• retroactive interference example 


  once you have learnt your new number it is often difficult to recall your old number
• interference theory 


  suggest that forgetting is caused by competing memories either because existing memories interfere with the learning of new information or because new information interferes with previously learnt information
• Keppel and underwood study

  • participants presented with meaningless 3 letter consonant trigrams at different intervals

  • to prevent rehearsal, participants had to count backwards in threes before recalling
• result of kepple and underwood study

  participants typically remembered trigrams that were presented first, irrespective of interval length
• baddley and hitch study

  • rugby players who had played every match in the season and players who had misse some games due to injury

  • the length of time from start to end of the season was the same and players were asked to recall the names of the teams they had played against earlier in the season
• result of baddley and hitch study

  the player who had played the most games forgot proportionally more games than those who had players fewer games due to injury
• interference


  is an explanation for forgetting that occurs when two pieces of information disrupt one another
• counterpoint to baddley and hitch study

  • lab experiments have low ecological validity
  • they are conducted in an artificial setting which may not always be a reliable explanation and difficult to generalise
  • although it is possible to create the conditions needed to cause interference in lab studies, forgetting may be better explained by other theories
• Tulving and Psotka study

  • recall rate of lists were 70% initially but dropped when they had to remember more lists of words. however when given retrieval cues their recall increased back to 70%
  • suggests the presence of a retrieval cue improves memory recall, therefore reversing the effect of interference