Thought Suppression

The idea that suppressing an unwanted thought results in an ironic increase in its frequency is accepted as psychological fact. Wegner’s ironic processes model has been applied to understanding the development and persistence of mood, anxiety, and other difficulties. However, results are highly inconsistent and heavily influenced by experimental artifact. There are a substantial number of methodological considerations and issues that may underlie the inconsistent findings in the literature. These include the internal and external validity of the paradigms used to study thought suppression, conceptual issues such as what constitutes a thought, and consideration of participants’ history with and motivation to suppress the target thought. Paradigms that study the products of failed suppression, such as facilitated recall and attentional deployment to thought relevant stimuli may have greater validity. It is argued that a shift from conceptualizing the persistence of unwanted thoughts as products of failed suppression and instead as internal threat stimuli may have merit.

Repetition inhibition and facilitation effects for visual-verbal stimuli under conditions of concurrent articulation

This study examines the effects of within-sequence repetitions for visually presented consonants under conditions of quiet and concurrent articulation (CA). In an immediate serial recall (ISR) procedure, participants wrote down the six consonants in the order of original presentation. CA reduced serial recall and abolished the phonological similarity effect. However, the effects of within-trial repetitions were broadly similar under quiet and CA. Specifically, adjacent repetitions facilitated recall of the repeated item, whereas spaced repetitions (separated by three intervening items) impaired recall accuracy for the repeated item (i.e., the Ranschburg effect). These data are the first to demonstrate the Ranschburg effect for visual-verbal stimuli under CA.

Interference Effects on the Recall of Words Heard and Read: Considerations for ATC Communication

Two experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of interference on memory for words that were either read or heard. Interference tasks required either visual, verbal, or central executive (CE) working memory resources. Experiment 1 examined effects of simultaneous interference, whereas Experiment 2 examined the effects of posttask (subsequent) interference. When interference occurred simultaneously with word presentation, the verbal and CE interference tasks were most disruptive, regardless of whether the words were read or heard. Furthermore, hearing words facilitated recall in comparison to reading words regardless of interference source. When the interference task followed word presentation, CE interference again was the most disruptive. However, the effects of the visual and verbal interference tasks were equivalent. These results are discussed with respect to communication mode in ATC messages to pilots (i.e., textual data-link messages vs. voice transmissions).

Odors as Cues for the Recall of Words Unrelated to Odor

The effectiveness of an ambient odor as a retrieval cue for words unrelated to odor was investigated. After incidental learning of 40 adjectives, 40 participants were tested for recall during three unannounced recall phases (15 min., 48 hr., and 5 days). Participants in two control conditions learned with no odor present and either had no odor present during any recall phase or only during recall after 5 days. Participants in two conditions learned with an odor present and either had the odor present during recall only after 5 days or during recall both after 15 min. and after 5 days. Analyses indicated that, while participants in the control conditions recalled significantly less during each succeeding recall phase, recall by participants in the two experimental conditions did not decrease significantly. Recall by participants in the two experimental conditions was significantly higher during recall after 5 days (when the odor was reintroduced) than either control group. The addition of a salient cue during learning and retrieval facilitated recall more than the presence of constant environmental cues.

Testing the Efficacy of Name Mnemonics Used during Conversation

Previous studies successfully used the face-name mnemonic to improve recall of fictitious surnames of individuals appearing in photographs. Exps. 1 and 2 tested whether this mnemonic could also aid recall of the actual surnames of real people met during conversations. Exp. 1, like previous studies, showed that the face-name mnemonic facilitated recall of surnames of photographed individuals; however, this mnemonic reduced name recall following conversations. Exp. 2 refined the procedure used in Exp. 1 by including a control group in the design and strengthening the training procedures for the face-name mnemonic group. The results of Exp. 2 paralleled those of Exp. 1, again showing no advantage to using the face-name mnemonic during conversation. Exp. 3 explored alternatives to the face-name mnemonic, and featured use of self-help mnemonics (those initiated by the learner without help from others) and stranger-provided mnemonics (those provided by the person whose name was being memorized). A combination of self-help and stranger-provided mnemonics produced significantly greater recall of surnames following conversation than that achieved by self-help strategies alone, a control group, or the face-name mnemonic.

Self-Generated Mnemonics for Number Recall in Young and Old Adults

Self-generated strategies for recall of number facts were examined in 164 adults who ranged in age from 20 to 86 years. Participants recalled a number list that included six 2-digit prices and six 4-digit phone numbers Following recall, participants reported their encoding strategies A larger percentage of the younger subjects (< 49 yr.) reported using a specific verbal mediator to facilitate encoding, and younger subjects recalled more 2-digit and 4-digit numbers. Across age groups, the self-reported use of encoding strategies facilitated recall.

Read Something Once, Why Read it Again?: Repetitive Reading and Recall

Seventy-two college students were instructed that they would be reading a text either once or twice. Then, half of each instruction group were allowed to read the text once, and half were required to read the text twice. All subjects were then tested for factual retention and for transfer. The instruction that a text could be read twice facilitated recall, even if the text was only read once. Reduced anxiety appears to be the simplest explanation for this. Reading a text twice increased factual retention, but on the transfer test, an interaction with ability was found. Only high ability students showed improvement with a second reading on the transfer test. Results are interpreted in terms of Mayer's processing strategies in that good readers benefit both qualitatively and quantitatively from repetition. Poor readers benefit only quantitatively from the opportunity to reread.

Spontaneous Verbal Elaboration in Gifted and Non-Gifted Youths

In two experiments, differences were investigated between gifted youths and comparison groups with respect to: (a) performance on paired-associate tasks involving meaningful and nonmeaningful words; (b) reported use of spontaneously produced learning strategies; and (c) degree to which learning strategies facilitated recall. Under free-study conditions, gifted youths outperformed their age peers in recall and strategy use, for both meaningful and nonmeaningful word pairs. In both experiments, gifted youths appeared to benefit greatly from mediational strategy use. Results of this and previous investigations, taken together, suggest that the learning of gifted students may be inhibited by rate learning environments which are too highly structured. When gifted learners were allowed to study at their own pace and develop their own learning strategies, performance increased.