Abstract

Recent evidence suggests that enacting compared to reading action phrases during encoding increases item-specific processing, but hampers “retrieval” (i.e. processes uniquely required in a free-recall test). Based on this notion, we predicted an enactment effect in free recall—a memory test that is supposed to rely on both processing types—and its size to be attenuated over the learning phase. In a multi-trial, study–test learning paradigm, participants (N = 40) studied and free-recalled repeatedly the same 24 action phrases either by enacting them or by reading them aloud during study trials. As predicted, we demonstrated the enactment effect only for the first study–test cycle, and then this mnemonic advantage attenuated over the remaining cycles. The present results support the notion that enactment increases item-specific processing but hampers retrieval.

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