Perfect recall and total forgetting: A problem for models of short-term memory

Abstract

In two paired-associate probe experiments, the items in the last input position in five-pair lists were recalled perfectly in immediate recall, but practically never in a subsequent delayed recall test. Other items in the list were recalled at intermediate levels in both tests. This “negative recency” effect in delayed recall occurred regardless of whether a pair had or had not been tested in immediate recall. These results, at variance with predictions derived from some current models of memory, suggest that pairs in terminal input positions are deliberately not processed and stored by S s in a manner allowing their later recall from long-term memory.