Proactive Interference In Short-term Memory Research Articles

Serial Dependence across Perception, Attention, and Memory

Information that has been recently perceived or remembered can bias current processing. This has been viewed as both a corrupting (e.g., proactive interference in short-term memory) and stabilizing (e.g., serial dependence in perception) phenomenon. We hypothesize that this bias is a generally adaptive aspect of brain function that leads to occasionally maladaptive outcomes.

Encoding Processes and Release from Proactive Interference in Short-Term Memory of Preschool Children

Abstract A modified proactive interference paradigm was developed to investigate encoding and memory processes in preschool-age children. The buildup and release from proactive interference in preschool-age children parallels that of adults and of mentally retarded persons, indicating that very young children and older people may use many of the same encoding dimensions.

Item similarity and proactive interference in short-term memory

The present paper addresses the question of the nature of interitem similarity effects in short-term retention. An interference theory prediction is pitted against an opposing expectation based on a cognitive strategy subjects could use in the “release-from-PI” paradigm. The experiment consisted of three conditions that differed in the extent of overlap among items in the short-term retention task. Results supported interference theory, in that increasing the interitem similarity of the to-be-recalled items resulted in a substantial decrease in correct recall.

Transfer failure and proactive interference in short-term memory.

Transfer failure and proactive interference in short-term memory.

Transfer failure and proactive interference in short-term memory.

Transfer failure and proactive interference in short-term memory.

Competition processes and proactive interference in short-term memory

A competition model of proactive interference in short-term memory would predict that if subjects are forced to emit low-confidence responses, there will be an increase in both the probability of a correct response and in the number of intrusions. Dillon and Thomas ( Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 1975 , 14, 603–615) recently performed such an experiment by forcing subjects to guess and found a very modest increase in the probability of a correct response at the cost of a large increase in intrusions. They suggest that these data contradict a competition model. We first argue that their results are not discrepant with the predictions of any realistic competition model and then perform an experiment which tests this same prediction in a slightly different situation. In an experiment using single-word items with conditions arranged so that the probability of a correct response is near one, subjects are run under three different speed-accuracy trade-off conditions: high accuracy, intermediate, and high speed. A competition model would predict that when subjects are forced to respond quickly, there will be an increase in errors, and these errors will tend to be from recent past items. This prediction was confirmed.

Proactive Interference in Short-Term Memory: Recall Probability as a Function of Prior Item Recall

In two different experiments, one with 23 brain surgery patients and one with 39 college students, proactive interference in short-term memory was evaluated as a function of the recall of the just preceding item in a Brown-Peterson distractor technique. In the first experiment, the probability of an error following an error was .25, and the probability of an error following a correct item was .24. In the second experiment, there was also no significant effect ( p > .05) of either prior item repetition or recall upon recall of the subsequent item, except in the case of prior items having a retention interval of 24 sec. In that case, well-remembered items exerted less proactive interference than items on which an error had been made. The results were evaluated in terms of a theory derived from the selector mechanism proposed for long-term memory (Postman, Stark, & Fraser, 1968).

Proactive interference in short-term memory: Fundamental forgetting processes

Two possible models of forgetting in a short-term memory task subject to proactive interference are considered. One model assumes that the fundamental forgetting process is competition while the other relies upon a decay of the memory trace. Both models are shown to provide plausible, quantitatively accurate explanations of forgetting in the Brown-Peterson situation. Two general classes of models are defined, and some data are presented which deny the feasibility of the class which contains the decay model as a special case. A tentative model, based on the assumption that retrieval depends upon temporal discriminations and a “filtering” of traces is proposed.

Perseverative Errors in Search by Young Infants

HARRIS, P. L. Perseverative Errors in Search by Young Infants. CImLD DEVELOPMENT, 1973, 44, 28-33. 3 experiments are presented which examine the ability of 10-month-old infants to search in a new hiding place. The experiments showed that infants of this age can search correctly, but that errors are more likely if a delay is introduced and if cues previously associated with finding the object distract the infant after its disappearance into a new hiding place. A hypothesis of proactive interference in short-term memory is proposed to explain the above results and other findings reported in the literature.

Effect of recalling on proactive interference in short-term memory.

Effect of recalling on proactive interference in short-term memory.

Presentation modality, distractor modality, and proactive interference in short-term memory.

Presentation modality, distractor modality, and proactive interference in short-term memory.

Subsequent recognition of items subjected to proactive interference in short-term memory

Each of 90 Ss was given five successive short-term memory (STM) tests with a triad of country names as the memory material on each test. Recall performance deteriorated across the series of STM tests. Immediately subsequent to the tests, each S was given a recognition test consisting of the 15 country names presented in the STM test series and 30 “new” country names. Each S was required to indicate whether a word was “old” or “new” and to give a confidence rating of his judgment. Operating characteristics for each of the five STM tests were computed for recalled and nonrecalled words. The data suggest that decline in recall performance across a series of STM tests (proactive interference) is due to several factors: an increasing inability to discriminate among items in storage and an increasing failure of items to gain access to storage or to stay in storage.

Polarity on the semantic differential and release from proactive interference in short-term memory

Word triads rated on the semantic differential were used as the to-be-remembered items in three successive short-term memory tests. For both the experimental and control conditions the dimension of the semantic differential from which a triad was drawn varied on each of the three tests. In the control condition, however, polarity was held constant across the tests, and in the experimental condition the polarity of the triad on the third test differed from the polarity of the triads on the preceding two tests. A release from proactive interference was observed with change in polarity and proactive interference was observed to develop across the evaluative, activity, and potency dimensions of the semantic differential when polarity was held constant.

Proactive Interference in Short-Term Memory as a Function of Prior-Item Retention Interval

The experiment was conducted to examine the effect of prior-item retention interval on the retention of a given item in a short-term memory test series. There were five conditions. The retention interval for the fifth test of five successive tests was 15 sec. for all five conditions. The retention intervals for tests 1–4 were constant for a condition but varied across conditions. These retention intervals were 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 sec. Five consonant trigrams constructed from the set of letters sharing the vowel sound “e” were used for all conditions. Recall on test 5 was a direct function of prior-item retention interval. The data indicate, therefore, that the availability of prior items for proactive interference is an inverse function of prior-item retention interval.

Release from proactive interference in short-term memory as a function of change in visual and phonemic structure and retention interval

Experiment 1 demonstrated that in a short-term memory (STM) test series, a shift from a horizontal arrangement of the consonants comprising visually presented trigrams to a vertical arrangement, with phoneme class held constant, produced a highly significant release from proactive interference (PI). Release from PI was also observed with a shift from one phoneme class to another with spatial arrangement held constant. The effects of visual change and phoneme change were independent of each other. Experiment 2 verified the PI release effect of phoneme class change but failed to confirm an observation in Experiment 1 that the effect of phoneme change was a function of the retention interval. The results were discussed in relation to interpretations of PI in STM and the interpretation of STM as a linguistic system.

Taxonomic categories and proactive interference in short-term memory

The Ss were given four successive short-term memory trials with word triads. The retention interval was either 5 sec for all four trials or 15 sec for all four trials. When the word triads on each trial were drawn from different taxonomic classes, proactive interference was not found to develop across trials for either the 5-sec or 15-sec retention intervals. Furthermore, when the word triads on Trials 1-3 were from the same taxonomic class and the word triad on Trial 4 was from another taxonomic class, a release from proactive interference was obtained in both the 5-sec and 15-sec retention interval conditions. The results suggest that proactive interference in short-term memory is relatively class-specific and that release from proactive interference is best explained by an interference interpretation rather than a novelty interpretation.

Effects of changes in word length on proactive interference in short-term memory

The effects of changes in word length on proactive interference (PI) were assessed in an STM situation. Four trials with words of the same length or three trials of one length and the fourth with words of the other length were given. Length of the retention interval on Trial 4 was varied. Evidence for PI was found after Trial 1. Recall remained depressed when word length did not change, but retention on Trial 4 improved when word length changed. Variation in retention interval had no effect. The results indicate that word length is a stimulus feature that Ss encode, and that a change in this feature reduces interference.

Connotative classification and proactive interference in short-term memory

Each of 36u1Ss received four successive short-term memory tests with connotatively defined word triads. All Ss in all conditions were presented on Test 4 with a word triad classified as evaluative negative on the semantic differential The connotative classification of the triads on Tests 1–3 differed across conditions. A release from proactive interference was observed on Test 4 for both within-dimension and between-dimension shifts in connotation for both a 5-sec retention interval test series and a 20-sec retention interval test series. Proactive interference was not prevented, however, by changing the connotative classification of the triads on each of the successive short-term memory tests. The results also suggested that a release from proactive interference could be obtained with a change in polarity independent of connotative dimension changes.

Attenuation of proactive interference in short-term memory as a function of cueing to forget.

Attenuation of proactive interference in short-term memory as a function of cueing to forget.

The structure of order error in the build-up of proactive interference in short-term memory

Order errors produced in the generation of proaction in the short-term retention of trigrams were analyzed in terms of their phonemic similarity to the correct items. Employing five successive applications of a short-term memory distractor technique with a 12 sec retention interval it was observed that items transposed within a trigram were phonemically related to the correct items but position intrusions from preceding trigrams were not. Both types of error-production remained invariant across the five trials. The data were considered in the framework of models of order storage in short-term memory.