Forgetting:interference

• Interference-

  P- proactive

  O- old

  R- retroactive

  N- new
• Interference-

  • Interference is when 2 pieces of information disrupt each other, which may result in forgetting 1 or both pieces of information.
  • Proactive interference: when previously learned information interferes with remembering new information.
  • Retroactive interference: when new information interferes with remembering previously learned information.
• Interference-

  McDonald and McGeoch 1931 –

  • Interference is worse when the memories/learning are similar.
  • Retroactive interference: Participants learnt a list of 10 words until they were remembered with 100% accuracy.
  • Then learnt 10 new words that were varying in similarities to the old words.
  • 6 groups of participants with different types of new lists: synonyms, antonyms, unrelated, constant syllables, 3-digit numbers, no new list (being the control).
  • When asked to recall the first list, the group with the synonyms performed the worst, interference is the strongest with similar memories.
• Interference-

  CPS- Evidence that interference effects lots in daily life, high validity- Baddeley and Hitch (1977) asked rugby players to recall the teams they’d played against in the season, players who played the most had the worst recall.

  CPW- Interference is a rare thing to occur in normal life, labs have highly controlled conditions to create interference, so forgetting can be explained better through retrieval failure due to lack of cues.
• Interference-

  S- Retrograde facilitation - Coenen and Luijtelaar (1997) gave participants lists of words, asked to recall later assuming the interview will cause interference, when learnt on a drug diazepam caused poor recall in a week (compared to a placebo), when learnt before taking the drug, placebo was better.

  W- Interference can be overcome by cues – Tulving and Psotka (1971) lists of words to be organised into categories (not told what categories), 70% recalled the first list, worsened after each list was learnt, at the end a cued recall test was given, and recall became 70% again.