Linguistic and imaginal mnemonics in paired-associate recall

Abstract

A comparison was made between mental imagery and sentence memorization as mnemonic aids to the recall of noun-noun paired associates. Data were obtained to allow postexperimental selection of Ss who appeared to have been most proficient at carrying out the instructional sets associated with each mnemonic. Data from these Ss were analyzed within a design permitting a study of noun similarity and associational direction. Mental imagery was superior to sentence memorization, recall of nonsimilar nouns superior to similar, and forward recall superior to backward. Also, a significant interaction indicated that noun similarity produced relatively greater difficulty for the image-mnemonic Ss. It is concluded that the use of mental imagery in recall cannot be reduced entirely to linguistic mechanisms.