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Changes In Memory As A Function Of Age
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Changes In Memory As A Function Of Age
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INFORMATION TO USERS
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Xerox University Microfilms
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74-21,481
JOHNSON, Lance King, 1943-
CHANGES IN MEMORY AS A FUNCTION OF AGE.
University of Southern California, Ph.D., 1974
Psychology, experimental
v U niversity Microfilms, A XEROX C o m p an y , A nn Arbor, M ichigan |
THIS DISSERTATION HAS BEEN MICROFILMED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED.
£
© 1974
LANCE KING JOHNSON
A LL RIGHTS RESERV ED
CHANGES IN MEMORY AS A
FUNCTION OF AGE
by
Lance King Johnson
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(Psychology)
January 197^
U NIVERSITY O F SO U T H E R N CA LIFORNIA
TH E GRADUATE SCHOO L
U NIVERSITY PARK
LOS A N G ELES. CA LIFO R N IA 9 0 0 0 7
This dissertation, written by
Lane* ..King„ Johna©n..........
under the direction of Dissertation Com
mittee, and approved by all its members, has
been presented to and accepted by The Graduate
School, in partial fulfillment of requirements of
the degree of
D O C T O R OF P H IL O S O P H Y
Date..2y.jS3&ky^l^.A%±LT33
ISSERTATION COMMITTEE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There are a few people who have helped me over the
last several years in graduate school. My thanks goes to
Dr. James E. Birren for all the knowledge he has imparted
to his students in the many seminars we have had together
and his guidance on this dissertation and other projects.
I would also like to thank Dr. James P. Walker for his sup
port and friendship. He always willingly took time to give
me help and encouragement.
The most thanks goes to my family, especially to my
beautiful wife, Sandra, whose love and devotion has given
me the inner strength to carry on, to my lovely little girl,
Chantelle, who has brought happiness and a special meaning
into my life, and last to my four wonderful dogs who spent
hours every night lying in my study waiting for me to turn
off the light so they could go to bed.
li
CONTENTS
Page
LIST OP TABLES..................................... v
LIST OP FIGURES................................... Vi
Chapter
I. INTRODUCTION............ .................. 1
Background of the Problem
Short-term Memory
Short-term Memory and the
Aging Individual
Recognition and Recall
Cued Recall
Incidental and Intentional Learning
Theories of Memory Loss in the Aged
II. STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM................... 57
Hypotheses
III. DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY OF
THE FIRST EXPERIMENT.................... 61
Intentional Learning
IV. RESULTS OF THE FIRST EXPERIMENT........... 64
Intentional Learning
V. DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY OF
THE SECOND EXPERIMENT.................. 68
Incidental Learning
VI. RESULTS OF THE SECOND EXPERIMENT ......... 71
Incidental Learning
VII. DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY OF
THE THIRD EXPERIMENT .... * .......... jS
Intentional and Incidental Learning
lil
Chapter Page
VIII. RESULTS OF THE THIRD EXPERIMENT.......... 79
Intentional and Incidental Learning
IX. DISCUSSION ........ ...... 83
REFERENCES.......................................... 100
lv
LIST OP TABLES
Table Page
1. Experiment I. Mean Number of Words
Free Recalled, Cue Recalled,
and Recognized............................ 66
2. Experiment II. Mean Number of Words
Recalled, Cue Recalled,
and Recognized............................ 73
3. Experiment III. Mean Number of Words
Recalled under the Three Learning
Conditions, Prompter Probability
Levels, and A g e ........................... 80
4. Three-way Analysis of Variance of
Experiment III............................ 8l
v
LIST OP FIGURES
Figure Page
1. A Plot of Cell Means of the Young
and Old Age Group............................ 65
2. A Plot of Cell Means of the Young
and Old Age Group........................... 72
vi
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Problem
It is often thought that as a person becomes
older he becomes less capable due to a decline In his abil
ity to learn, retain, and remember. It Is Important to
keep In mind, however, since bo many complex subject vari
ables are affecting performance, that these must be taken
into consideration when using age as an Independent vari
able (Birren, 1964) .
One problem encountered when studying memory in
the aged, as compared to the young, is that It Is difficult
to determine where a breakdown of the memory system may
occur. It could be that the retentive capacity is the same
In both age groups but that the older person does not learn
or register the Information as efficiently In the first
place. Eisdorfer (1967) suggested
that autonomic and performance factors play a sig
nificant role In attempts to define learning abil
ity in the aged and that much of the deficit in
learning studies which is observed may be an arti
fact of our failure to understand these variables
[p. 18],
1
In order to gain an understanding of the real
nature of memory loss in older people, we must differenti
ate between the various types of memory. It is important
not only to study memory span but the ability to form new
associations beyond the simple memory span. As Gilbert
(19^1) stated, "We must study both verbal and non-verbal
memory, immediate, free recall of meaningful verbal materi
al, immediate, controlled recall, and retention of both
types of material [p. 7^]."
Few psychologists would dispute the observation
that memory tends to deteriorate with age. But what mech
anisms or variables are responsible for this deterioration
is what most psychologists would like to be able to spec
ify.
Acquisition of Retention
Many Investigators are not only interested in the
variables which contribute to those performance changes
that are known as acquisition, but also /bo the persistence
of thoBe changes, retention.
Melton (1 9 6 3) haB stated that a change from
Trial N to N + 1 is referred to as a learning change when
the variable of interest is the ordinal number of Trial N
and not the temporal interval between Trial N and N + 1.
However, when the variable of interest is the interval
itself, then it is considered a retention change.
3
The concept of forgetting, on the other hand, is
just the opposite of retention, the former referring to
the amount which has been lost and the latter referring to
the amount of information that has been retained.
The experimental procedure used in moBt studies
employs free learning or recall trials. In keeping with
this recall classification, moBt investigators have
assumed that the variables which have been investigated
provide information about how the individual retains
material rather than how much is learned (Hall, 1966).
Registration
We know not all things that are perceived are
remembered. There Is some type of mechanism that Is
capable of transforming percepts into memories in such a
way that they can be recognized or recalled at a later
time. This procesB, known as registration, Is necessary
to account for certain disorders of learning and memory
where a deficit is observed. These deficits are often
treated as failures of memory— short-term memory— but Buch
classifications do not separate the operations of acquir
ing, storing, or retrieving information. Both experimen
tally and behaviorally these are different operations and
theoretically could be impaired independently of each
other (Talland, 1968).
4
Registration also involves operations of* trans
formation and coding, since visual images cannot be stored
exactly as they were formed on the retina, and information
received through the other sensory channels is even less
suitable for isomorphic recording. Much of the information
that is registered is not perceptual at all. Concepts,
abstractions, relationships, and plans can only be
recorded and stored in codes.
With the advent of information theory the magni
tude of the transformation involved in coding can be
determined quantitatively and this is what Posner and
RoBsman (1 9 6 5) did in an experiment of short-term reten
tion which, among other things, demonstrated that lapBe of
time is not necessarily a major determinant of forgetting.
Whether immediate recall under these conditions tests
short-term memory or registration, it is evident that some
information is apt to be lost in the process of its coding
for retention and^Jbhe loss depends more on the difficulty
of the transform than interfering items listed, or on the
length of delay before recall.
In another experiment Posner and Rossman (1 9 6 6)
showed the enhancing effect of transformation on the reten
tion of a message. Transformation demands some attention
and that would increase the probability of remembering the
information that undergoes the process. Up to a point
greater complexity of the transformation may increase the
chances of correct recall, hut it is also likely to
increase the incidence of errors and of those alterations
that are necessary to fit some information into a pre
existing schema. Defects in learning and in memory could
arise from this process and would differ according to the
learnerrs capacity to perform the required transformations,
as well as his access to appropriate coding templates
(Talland, 1 9 6 8).
Transformation
When a subject is required to recall a response,
for example the trigram GLA, it is possible that the unit
of information learned is isomorphic to the trigram which
was objectively presented. However, it seems that this is
not the procedure that a subject usually follows. More
frequently the subject transforms the unit for memory
storage into something different than that which was pre
sented. For example, mnemonic devices are often utilized
to aid the individual in recalling the material. The
trigram (GLA) might be coded as GLASS along with the addi
tional memory unit— "the first three letters." Allen
(1 9 6 1) had his subjects learn a randomized order of the
alphabet. The Ss turned over a card with one letter on it
and said the letter aloud until all 26 letters were re
peated. A recall trial then followed thiB presentation.
This procedure was repeated until the subject could
correctly recall the entire sequence of 26 letters. He
found that all his subjects organized the letters Into
manageable units with frequent meaningful translations
(Hall, 1966).
Underwood and Keppel (1963) found that coding
may Inhibit as well as facilitate recall. They presented
ten trigrams to Ss for five alternate study and recall
trials. The trigrams presented, however, could be coded
into either of two words by rearranging the letters. For
example, UTB could be changed to either TUB or BUT. The
results indicated that if the Ss were permitted to recall
the letters of each trigram in any order, performance was
facilitated if the trigrams were encoded into words. If
the _S was required to recall the trigram as It was pre
sented, the £ > did best if he did not try to encode the
trigram into a word. The reason given for this inhibitory
effect of coding was that although coding was simple, a
specific decoding rule had to be learned to each coded
trigram.
Miller (1956) brought attention to the fact that
the immediate memory Bpan is about seven. This can be
substantially increased, however, if the Individual codes
material into familiar units. Although seven chunks seem
to be the limit for Immediate memory, these chunks can be
increased effectively by building larger and larger
chunks. An example that Miller used is the individual
just beginning to learn telegraphic code.
Short-term Memory
It is a well-known fact that a very limited
amount of material can be retained at any one time in
STM. A number of studies have been done to establish what
the ''immediate memory span" can hold In store. Generally,
It seems that about seven digits, letters, or some other
type of unit can be retained in STM (Miller, 1956).
Brown (1958) has also shown that the span Is reduced if
the subject shifts his attention to other material during
the period between presentation and recall. This inter
ference may arise not only from extra items during the
period of retention but from the presentation of addi
tional items to be recalled (Norman, 1 9 6 6), and it tends
to be greater when the original and Interpolated items are
closely similar than when they are very different. Thus
interpolated letters which are phonetically similar to
those being retained have a greater effect than letters
which are phonetically dissimilar (Wickelgren, 1966), and
learning a list of letterB Interferes less with the reten
tion of digits than does either learning further digits or
merely reciting digits (Welford, 1958).
Brown (1958) has also demonstrated that short
term memory can be enhanced by rehearsing the material
between presentation and recall. This was also found by
Sanders (1961)* who had his subjects rehearse 8 digits
during the interval between presentation and recall. His
results showed retention to be better if the rehearsal had
lasted for 40 seconds than if it had only lasted for 12
seconds: the longer period of rehearsal had increased the
resistance to interference.
What effects the rehearsal effect has are not
entirely clear. It could be that rehearsal serves to keep
the memory trace from decaying* but this cannot account
for the increased resistance to interference from inter-
vening activity.
Heron (1962) found that while rehearsal generally
aids in retention* it may hinder it. In his experiment he
had Ss dial an 8-digit number. If they dialled immediately
after they had been presented the digits they did much
better than if they rehearsed them or wrote them down
first. It can be seen that while rehearsal seems to be
beneficial in some types of tasks* the particular task
determines the outcome.
In an attempt to explain some of the losses in
short-term memory* four different theories have been pro
posed:
Broadbent (1957) proposed a decay theory which
maintained that only a limited amount of Information could
be held in STM for a finite period of time. This period
of time could be extended, however, by means of rehearsal.
If the material was re-circulated through the central
mechanism It could be held for an Indefinite period of
time.
Evidence that favored this view was put forth by
Conrad (1957)j whose subjects were given digits at two
different rates of presentation. He found that the faster
rate waB superior to the slower rate in the number cor
rectly recalled. PraBer (1958) and Posner (1964) also
found similar results when comparing the rate of presenta
tion. A parallel finding using nonverbal material was
found by Erikson and Johnson (1964), when their Ss had to
report whether a tone had occurred during the period of
time they were reading a novel. The results showed a
decline In accuracy with the length of time that elapsed
between presentation of the tone and the posing of the
question of whether it had occurred. Similar indications
of a nonverbal context came from an experiment by Fralsse
(1942), who found that errors made in tapping out rhythms
which had been heard once increased both with the number
of sounds In the pattern and with the speed at which it
was presented (Welford, 1 9 5 8).
In a different type of experiment, Murdock (i9 6 0)
found that the number of words remembered In a single trial
was a linear function of the product of the number of items
and the time per Item. Murdock also found (1 9 6 5) that the
10
retention of pairs of words from a list depended upon the
length of time for which they were presented and not upon
the total number presented or upon whether the time was
concentrated in a single trial or distributed over a num
ber of trials. Waugh (1967) has reported similar findings.
She found that probability of recall was a linear function
of the time for which material was presented (Welford,
1958).
The extent to which time affects the short-term
memory span is still not clear. The longer the time
between presentation and recall, the more chance there is
of random disturbances and distractions to interfere with
retention. As against this, slower rates of presentation
give greater opportunity for re-coding and rehearsal which
might more than offset any effects of interference.
A second possibility that could cause a Iobs in
STM is the recall of the items themselveB. Evidence for
this has been demonstrated by Anderson (i9 6 0), whose sub
jects listened to three groups of four digits and then
either immediately or at intervals ranging up to 30 seconds
were told which group or groups to write down. The results
indicated that recall was most accurate when only one group
was called for and least accurate when all three had to be
reproduced. Howe (1966) has reported similar results
using three groups of three consonants, all of which had
11
to be reproduced immediately following presentation of the
last group. The groups were recalled in various orders
and accuracy tended to increase the earlier the group came
in order of recall.
Although evidence has Just been presented that
recall of some items may substantially impair the reten
tion of others., the effect is often small and certainly
not enough to explain the limitation of the immediate
memory span.
Anderson (i9 6 0) has shown that interference dur
ing presentation also has an affect on retention. In her
experiment three groups of items were presented to the Ss
and It was their task to recall one or more of the items.
It was found that the groups presented last were recalled
best. Since time held In store is not Important as such,
this suggests that the presentation of later Items muBt
interfere with the retention of earlier Items. Mackworth
(1964) has provided evidence for this by demonstrating
that accuracy of recall falls linearly with the length of
the list. Murdock (1 9 6 6), using a series of paired items
In which the subject was asked the stimulus member after
viewing the pairs, showed that accuracy of recall falls
with an increase in the number of pairs presented between
the pair concerned and its recall. Waugh and Norman
(1 9 6 5) have found similar results using single items.
12
After a string of itemB was presented* they re-presented
one and the subject was asked to recall the one which fol
lowed it. This technique has been used by Norman (1 9 6 6)*
who showed that retention depends essentially upon the
number of itemB intervening between presentation and
recall* and waB little affected by speed of presentation*
sense modality* type of item* or length of list.
The last theory that attempts to account for the
limited span of immediate memory states that the short
term store has a limited capacity and that interference
from subsequently presented items arises because they push
out those in the memory store. The problem with this the
ory is how to account for the fact that the store does not
reject the earlier or the later items* but instead loses
the middle items (Murdock* 1 9 6 2). It has been suggested
by Waugh and Norman (1 9 6 5) that this may be accounted for
if one thinkB of the last few items of a list as being in
a short-term memory store of limited capacity which works
on a rotational basis so that later items are pushed out
early. If this occurs it is possible that earlier items
may be preserved by getting through to the long-term store.
Whether this can account for the phenomenon or not is still
somewhat speculative* but it does account for a number of
facts otherwise difficult to explain (Welford, 1958).
In summary, it has been shown that many theories
have been hypothesized to account for the STM data, but as
13
yet no single theory can account for all the results.
The next section of this paper will review the
STM Btudies that have been done on the aging individual
and the changeb that have been attributed to the aging
process.
Short-term Memory and the
Aging Individual
Sperling (i9 6 0) and Averback and Coriell (1961)
all provide evidence that there is a purely perceptual
trace which does decay automatically. It appears that it
can be pre-empted by succeeding perceptual events but not,
evidently, by stored information. Although this short
term store seems to be free of normal interference, it is
subject to erasure by new information coming in a sensory
channel.
The question still remains whether STM should be
thought of as a dual process aB proposed by Hebb (1949)
and Broadbent (195^0 • Much of the evidence indicates that
decay of the memory trace is due entirely to interference
from other learned acts. If this is true then we can
think of STM as a unitary process. It could be that STM
and LTM are based on the same process. Postman (1964), in
an extensive review of the literature, came to this con
clusion.
14
If interference is the only cause of the decay
in-STM there is some problem in the fact that the decay is
bo complete. If a trigram that has a 90 percent probabil
ity of being recalled can be reduced nearly to zero, in 30
seconds, how then can some memories be retained over months
and years? The answer to this can be resolved by asserting
that memories that decay so rapidly are probably weak I
Peterson and Peterson (1959) showed that with over
learnings short-term forgetting was markedly decreased.
The difference between the long-term and short-term reten
tion studies seems to lie in the vastly greater resistance
to forgetting produced at the time of learning In the
studies of long-term retention; the stronger the verbal
habits at original learning, the slower the process of
forgetting (Deese, 19^7).
Many early investigators have stated that memory
ability declines with age (Meumann, '1913; Miles, 1933;
Gruhle, 1939)* Thorndike (1928) found a gradual Iobs in
the ability to learn after the age 20-25* Others have
found no decline In the learning ability until age 50
(Sorenson, 1930). Wechsler (1938) stated that although
memory span declines rapidly with old age, "older people
have other failings of which they might much more reason
ably complain than their poor memory [p. 212]." During
the last two decades much emphasis has been placed on the
15
differences found in memory as a function of age (Welford,
1958; Inglis, 1 9 6 5).
In order to assess age differences in memory, a
number of techniques have been employed so as to distin
guish the relative contributions of different types of
learning situations on the persistence of memory.
One variable that has shown significant effects
on subsequent recall Is the modality that Is being used.
Auditoraly presented Information has been shown to be more
easily recalled than visual information (Craik, 1 9 6 9;
Murdock, 19^7 j 1 9 6 8).
Murdock (1 9 6 6) showed that the retention of
words presented visually follows a somewhat different pat
tern from that of words presented aurally, and argued that
this implies different stores with different characteris
tics for eye and ear. McGhie, Chapman, and Lawson (1 9 6 5)
also found a modality difference which indicates superi
ority of auditory retention over visual retention in rela
tion to age. In their study, the stimuli were the same
for both sense modalities. A series of successive numbers
was presented visually and audltoraly, and the subjects had
to record when the two numbers of a series were repeated.
While this task does involve immediate memory function, it
Is the kind of task most often associated with attention
and vigilance. In any event, this memory attention task
was performed more poorly by subjects over 6 0 years of age
than Toy younger subjects, and this was more the case with
visual stimuli than with auditory stimuli. In another
experiment, Arenberg (1968) posed two questions: (l) Are
age differences smaller for visual displays augmented by
auditory input when the auditory input is active (when Sb
read material aloud)? (2) Are age differences in STM
smaller for auditory plus visual input than for visual
without auditory input? Arenberg1s results indicated that
not only was recall better at each auditory condition, but
that the older group benefited more than the younger group
under the two auditory conditions. It can be concluded
that auditory input has positive affects in STM, particu
larly for the old.
Many tests of memory have been devised in order
to determine where the breakdown in memory occurs with age.
If a pure teBt of memory is used such as a visual or audi
tory forward digit span, no significant age differences
are found (Gilbert, 19^1; Bromley, 1958; Kriauciunas,
1 9 6 8). However, if the task is to repeat the digits in
reverse order, a statistically significant difference is
found between young and old subjects (Gilbert, 19^1;
Bromley, 1958). This discrepancy is evidently in the task
requirements of the memory situation. The digit span for
ward is actually measuring the memory capacity of the per
ceptual system for meaningful material. On the other hand,
the reverse digit span is requiring the subject to trans
17
form and reorganize the Information while at the same time
trying to receive new information for storage. Since the
storage of information is critical in any learning task
and a reorganization of information is an added burden to
the aged subject, the immediate memory span iB exceeded,
causing a differential loss of information.
Another variable that has gained importance is
the stimulus presentation time. By reducing the number of
presentations over time the subject is allowed more time
for rehearsal and organization of the material. However,
by reducing the number of presentations in a given amount
of time, more decay may take place and negate the positive
effects of a slower presentation period. Taub (1 9 6 6)
varied both the presentation time and the stimulus exposure
time on a free recall task given to young and old subjects.
His results indicated that both the young and older sub
jects recalled more items as the rate of presentation
decreased.
Others have studied these same variables with
different results. Eisdorfer, Axelrod, and Wilkie (1963)
and Arenberg (1 9 6 5) have emphasized the amount of time
given to respond rather than the amount of time given to
view the stimulus.
Fraser (1 9 5 8) found a differential loss in per
formance when the rate of aurally presented stimuli was
decreased. Significantly poorer performance for the older
Sb with the slow stimulus presentation was taken as evi
dence for a faster rate of decay of information with
increasing age. Other studies have found similar results
of aurally presented Btimuli with younger Ss (Conrad,
1958; Conrad & Hill, 1958), hut other studies where recall
of visual stimuli was required showed an increase in the
percent recalled as the rate was decreased (Monty, Tauh,
& Laughery, 1965; Posner, 1 9 6 3). Evidence from the visual
experiments with young Ss and from memory-loading stress
studies with various age groups (Broadbent & Heron, 1 9 6 2, *
Inglis & Ankus, 1 9 6 5) suggests that the major losses with
age may be due to the affects of interference rather than
decay.
As previously mentioned, Taub (1 9 6 6) found that
with visual presentation of stimuli, aged Ss retained
fewer letters than young, but that both benefited from
decreasing the rate of presentation. He interpreted these
resultB as meaning that memory losses With increasing age
are due to increased interference and as evidence against
the hypothesis that the major losses are due to a faster
rate of decay of memory traces in old than in young Ss.
Bromley's (1958) results have supported this where the
classical memory span has not been shown to be affected by
age even though a differential rate of decay should operate
in that test. There does seem to be a memory loss with
19
age, however, when the task stresses the individual either
by presenting information beyond his capacity, requiring
reorganization of the material, or when viewing it under
distracting conditions. Broadbent and Heron (1 9 6 2), al
though allowing for the possibility of memory decay, con
cluded from their experiments that an interference hypoth
esis may be the most appropriate explanation for immediate
memory losses as a function of aging.
Schonfield and Donaldson (1 9 6 6), using conditions
similar to those employed by Conrad and Hill (1958), pre
sented a series of eight digits at either 30 or 90 digits
per minute. They also varied the intra-series presentation
rate and compared the recall of slow-fast and fast-slow
series on three age groups. Their results showed that the
slow-fast Beries was recalled easier for all groups, but
only in the oldest group were the differences statistically
significant.
Ruch (193*0 conceived senility as a condition of
lowered biological "plasticity." He postulated that the
nervous system was less able to change and therefore
resulted in a decline in learning ability. According to
his hypothesis, the older subject should have greater dif
ficulty in learning information that involves a reorganiza
tion of existing habits. Under conditions in which famil
iar items have to be learned, less difficulty should be
experienced since they would require less extensive
20
structural changes in the nervous system. In order to test
the hypothesis of "plasticity," he administered three types
of learning situations: (a) false equations, (b) nonsense
equations, and (c) meaningful word pairs. Although Ruch's
results supported his hypothesis, Welford (1958) noted that
there was little difference in the percentage decline with
age between the three different types of equation situa
tions.
Korehin and Basowitz (1957) repeated the Ruch
study using only a young and an old group. Their results
were essentially the same except there was "virtually no
difference between scores on nonsense and interference
materials and no evidence of a greater degree of deficit
in the latter than in the former [p. 6 7]." Another find
ing was that the types of errors made during the learning
trials were different. The young subjects were more
likely to make some response to the stimulus items, whereas
the older subjects either responded correctly or not at
all.
Gladis and Braum (1958) studied the effects of
interference as a possible explanation for the memory
deficits found in the aged. The original learning (0L) of
a paired associates set was followed by four types of
interpolated learning (IL) in which the stimulus members
of the P-A were identical to those in 0L, but in which the
21
response members were varied through four degrees of sim
ilarity of meaning to the responses in OL. Their results
indicated that retroactive interference decreased as the
degree of similarity between the response members of OL and
IL increased. When vocabulary scores for the three groups
were adjusted, however, there were no significant differ
ences found between the three age groups.
Taub and Greiff (1 9 6 7) presented eight letters of
the alphabet on a memory drum at the rate of one per sec
ond. Six lists were presented to both the young and old
subjects under four different conditions. The data re
vealed that there was no difference between the two groups
when reporting the first half-set in the four conditions.
When reporting the second half-set of color letters, there
waB a significant age decrement for all conditions which
increased from halves to blocks to alteration. It was
concluded that the data do not support the idea of differ
ential decay due to age, but support the conclusion of
Friedman (1 9 6 6) that there is an age-related decline in
organizing capacity and a greater susceptibility to inter
ference during the storage and retrieval phases as task
difficulty increases.
Hulicks and GrosBman (1967) tested the effects
of mediators in a P-A learning task. Young and old sub
jects were tested under different degrees of specific
instructions in regard to making associations between
22
words presented. Their results showed that older subjects
made much less use of mediating techniques unless they
were specifically directed to do so. When the older sub
jects did use mediators, their performance was similar to
that of the younger subjects. Craik (1968) also attributed
performance deficits in older subjects to their inability
to use mediators.
Another possible factor in the age-related decre
ment in learning is that of acquisition differences between
age groups. Hulicka and Rust (1964), using the anticipa
tion method, tested young and old subjects for retention
after 15 minutes, one day, and one week. Although the
older subjects required more trials to reach the criterion
level, there was little difference in their scores after
15 minutes. When tested one day and one week later, how
ever, significant differences were found in their reten
tion scores.
Heron and Craik (1964) presented English and
Finnish subjects, who had knowledge only of their respec
tive languages, with digits and messages in both languages.
Their results indicated that young and old subjects were
approximately equal in recalling sounds foreign to them
but that the older subjects were at a disadvantage in
recalling material which was in some way meaningful to
them.
23
In a comprehensive study on memory loss in
senescence, Gilbert (l9 4l) examined 11 different types of
memory tests. The intellectual level of the two groups
was matched and a sample of 174 Ss between the ages of 60
and 69 and 174 S.s between the ages of 20 and 29 years was
used. Although she found significant age decrements on
all tasks, the losses varied from 8.5 percent to 60.4 per
cent with the least loss found on the digit span test and
the greatest loss found on the retention of a Turkish-
English vocabulary test. The results of this experiment
not only showed that there was a decline in the ability to
retain material with age, but emphasized the necessity of
controlling original intellectual level when measuring
decline of ability with advancing age. The older subjects
who were intellectually superior showed substantially less
loss on all memory tasks.
Welford (1958) suggested that short-term memory
is the key to understanding age deficits in learning and
performance. He pointed out that short-term memory is
Increasingly susceptible to interference by other activi
ties as age advances. An age decrement in short-term
memory would account for the observed decline in overall
learning ability and would explain the deficits in psycho-
motor performance and problem-solving ability. The physio
logical basis for Welford's argument stems from the
24
findings of brain cell loss,, lowered general activity, and
disorganization of the electroencephalogram (EEG).
Welford (1958) haB suggested that with increasing
age, a person is more susceptible to interference. Among
the forms of interference that might give rise to greater
retention losses with age are proactive inhibition,
intralist Interference, and response interference (Craik,
1968). Welford (1958) stated: "It would seem that some
process involved in responding exerts a serious interfering
effect upon the information stored in short-term memory
[p. 2 5 1]."
Gladis and Braun (1958) found that any inter
fering effect of response activity with age is limited to
the period before the retained material has been adequately
registered in short-term memory. It also appears that
there is either a loss of ability with age to rapidly
switch attention or that the older subject's total capac
ity to be divided between short-term memory and perception
is reduced.
Talland (19^5)> in order to determine the rela
tive effects of interference on learning, varied the dif
ficulty level on three learning tasks. In the first
learning condition subjects were asked to recall as many
words as they could in any order. The second task required
the subjects to recall only the words that had not been
repeated during a second trial of the original list of
25
words. This requires a type of mental gymnastics whereby
the subject has to match the second group of words to the
first and then discard them, waiting until all the words
in the second group have been presented but one. The last
group has a similar task as the second group, except they
are required to recall all of the words in any order but
the unrepeated words are to be recalled last. The results
of this study give credence to the fact that not only does
selective organization cause interference with the recall
process, but combined with vocal interference, large age
deficits emerge.
Welford (1958), in his discussion of learning
and memory, described a number of crucial phases— percep
tion, short-term storage, evolution of a durable trace,
the endurance of the trace, recall or retrieval, recogni
tion, and the use of recall material. He suggested that
if these stages are sequential, a breakdown in any one of
them could disrupt the learning process.
In summary, Welford (1958) suggested that the
decline with age in the efficiency of short-term memory is
not due to a decrease in the capacity of the short-term
store, but to increased liability to interference caused
by shifts of attention between perceptual and memory func
tions. The two possible explanations for this are either:
(l) the short-term memory trace decays unless attention Is
26
turned to storage rather than perception or response, or
(2) that there is a narrowing of attention with age
(Craik, 1968).
Inglis and Caird (1963)* a dichotic stimula
tion experiment, demonstrated that age affects the recall
of dichotic digit half spans of different lengths.
As age increased there was no significant impair
ment in the ability to recall the half-spans re
produced first. Progressively and significantly
greater difficulty is shown, however, in the
reproduction of the second half-spans. Further
more the longer the span to be recalled the great
er the difference, overall, between the first and
second half-spans [Inglis, 1965* P. 101].
Rabbitt (1968) suggested that a good way to study
the inefficiency that the old process information produces
is by using a computer analogy. Instead of looking at
speed and accuracy he looked at more complex criteria for
estimating the efficiency of performance.
Using the computer as a model there are three
apparent reasons why one computer may be faster than
another. (l) If the switching time is slow there will be
a constant time delay that will result in an overall slow
ing of the computer. (2) When given a set of data, the
faster computer will reduce the number of operations, I.e.,
It will minimize superfluous operations. (3) The size of
the computer will most likely play an important role. The
smaller computer may have to be programmed to break down
complex calculations into discrete steps. The larger
27
machine may he capable of "parallel" operations rather than
"in series" ones (Rabbitt, 1968).
Using the analogy between the obsolescent com
puter and the aging individual, it has been demonstrated
that the central nervous system processes the sequence of
operations more slowly as indicated by the results of a
number of psychomotor tasks (Welford, 1958; Birren, 1955).
An important point to remember is that the older person
not only processes information more slowly but that the
information is processed more inefficiently. The older
individual acts as an inefficiently programmed computer
carrying out more operations than are optimal for the spe
cific task. The third analogy that can be drawn between
the obsolescent computer and the aging individual is the
amount of information that can be processed in a given
unit of time. It appears that the young have a greater
information-handling capacity (Rabbitt, 1968).
How does age affect the span of immediate recall?
Talland said,
There is no reason to doubt that the ability to re
tain new information in a readily accessible state
deteriorates with age. This decline can be attrib
uted to an impairment of the mechanisms active in
either the acquisition or the retention of new in
formation, and there is experimental evidence to
support both explanations. Indeed, it seems quite
probable that efficiency declines with age in all
the processes that are involved in memory function,
in recall and recognition as well as in the initial
28
acquisition of information and whatever mechanisms
subserve the storage of information [1968, p. 9 4].
Many paired-associate learning experiments have
shown a deficit in middle age with a continual loss as age
progresses (Canestrari, 1963; Arenberg, 1965)• Hulicka and
Weiss (1965) have also shown that the efficiency with
which young and old establish new associations differs
with the older Ss requiring more time to reach the same
criterion, but once this has been accomplished retention
does not appear to deteriorate with age.
Wimer and Wigdor (1958) also found similar re
sults which indicated that there may be no age loss in
retention, as distinct from acquisition, when the degree
of original learning is controlled. In their experiment,
the learning material consisted of four paired associates,
and the retention interval was 15 minutes. Wimer (i960),
however, using the same experimental setting but with a
2 4-hour interval, found age losses in both (intentional)
learning and recall. Others have supported the contention
that there is a marked deficit with advanced age, which is
particularly acute after the seventh decade (Bromley, 1958j
Wechsler, 1958).
Talland (1968), using repeated free recall of
meaningful and meaningless consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC)
words, found that:
29
The capacity to acquire new verbal information
deteriorates with age more powerfully than the
other mechanisms of memory function. In opera-
tional terms, immediate recall or short-term re
tention declines most steadily with advancing
years [p. 95].
If we already know that with advancing age there
is a loss of cognitive functions, why do we continue to
test recall? This question was answered skillfully by
Talland:
With continued testing we are given a wide variety
of curves, including examples of relative stability
as well as of declining proficiency, over the span
of maturity. Differences between these curves
throw light on the mechanisms that deteriorate with
advancing age and that should be considered as dis
tinct components of the complex functions involved
in learning and memory [1968, p. 96].
Another approach has been taken by Murdock
(i960), who found that Ss recalled a constant number of
words plus a percentage of the total number In the list.
He hypothesi-zed that there could be a primary store for
immediate recall and a secondary long-term Btore that is
capable of holding material for a much longer period of
time. It has been suggested that the primary store is not
affected by the aging process while the secondary store
Is.
The primary memory store can be thought of as a
limited-capacity store whose trace decays rapidly and is
coded in terms of acoustic qualities. The secondary store
also Involves acoustic as well as semantic attributes and
it Is in this store that organization of the material,
30
recoding, or chunking is an important factor. "Retrieval
from the primary store would he a direct readout of the
traces that are still viable., whereas retrieval from the
secondary store involves a search process [Craik, 1969s
P. 1 5 9]."
The model of STM is very similar to the one sug
gested by Waugh and Norman (1965). They proposed "that the
capacity of the primary memory (PM) is governed by acoustic
content of the material to be remembered but otherwise
independent of the nature of the material." In their
model, "retrieval is seen as consisting of a direct readout
of the material in PM plus a search process through SM."
They contended that aging affects both registration into
and retrieval from SM but does not affect PM. The model
proposed by Waugh and Norman (1965) fits the data from a
number of experiments, but the effects of decay or inter
ference characteristics of material held in PM and SM, or
the place of an attention mechanism, have not been postu
lated as yet.
Robertson (1972) found similar results in that a
significantly larger number of words was recalled from
primary memory than from secondary memory. It was also
noted that more commission errors were made by the older
subjects. It was suggested
31
that age differences In recall performance may be
accounted for by differences In retrieval proc
esses in so far as the retrieval cues themselves
are not as readily or efficiently formulated nor
as efficiently stored [p. 201].
In summary* the results from several studies are
in agreement that the ability of short-term memory and
Immediate recall diminishes with age. Tests of short-term
memory* however* are really tests of what has been learned.
It is important therefore to guard against an incorrect
inference that retention ability declines with age when it
may have been acquisition ability which declined. As pre
viously indicated, age deficits in short-term memory may
be due more to non-cognitive factors which change with age
than to age changes in cognitive ability.
Recognition and Recall
Postman and Rau (1957)> in & review of the inter
relations among measures of retention* concluded: nThe one
fact for which there is substantial evidence is that tests
of recognition yield higher scores than do tests of recall
[p. 2 5]." There are generally two explanations for these
findings: (l) the difference in the number of alternatives
from which correct alternatives are to be selected (Davis*
Sutherland* & Judd* 1961)* and (2) the difference in the
amount and nature of retained information necessary for
identification and for the unaided reproduction of learned
items (McNulty* 1965)• There have been a few experiments
32
that have shown recall to be superior to recognition
(Bahrick & Bahrick, 1964; Lachman & Field, 1965)•
In studies comparing recognition to recall an
attempt has been made to determine the fundamental differ
ences between the psychological mechanisms at work during
these two operations. At present these mechanisms are not
fully understood.
Schonfield (1965) tested the hypothesis that
older people have special difficulty in retrieving memories
from storage. It was argued that retrieval difficulty and
not acquisition difficulty would affect recall but not
recognition. His results supported this hypothesis by
showing no age-related differences in recognition scores
but a consistent drop In recall scores with age.
Freedman and Landauer (1966) found that failure
in retrieval can be overcome not only in a recognition test
where the whole item is presented, but also by giving cues
such as the first letter of a word.
McNulty and Caird (1966) were not in agreement
with the previous experiments. They proposed that the
defect is In the storage system Itself and that retrieval
difficulty does not account for the differences among age
groups In recall and recognition scores.
Woodworth and Schosberg (1954) described the
difference between recognition and recall by saying that in
33
a recognition task one starts with the object given whereas
in recall one has to find the object.
Kintsch (1970) suggested that the basic differ
ence between the two processes is that recall involves a
search process and recognition does not.
Although recognition is usually superior to
recall, Bruce and Cofer (1967) have shown that thiB depends
upon the experimental conditions and may be reversed by
making distractor items on the recognition test highly
similar to the study item.
The most significant difference between recall
and recognition appears to be that associative interference
plays a major role in recall but not in recognition.
Kintsch (1970) stated,
The single item, or the single memory trace, ap
pears to be the appropriate unit of analysis in
the case of recognition memory, while recall is
determined by interrelationships among itemB both
within a liBt and between different liBts [p.
2791.
Cofer (1967) gave his £s 15-word lists that were
composed either of highly associated items, weakly associ
ated items, or unrelated words. His results indicated
that high association lists were recalled better, but that
there was no difference in recognition performance,
Kintsch (1968), to test the dual process theory
which holds that there is a qualitative difference between
34
recognition and recall., prepared lists of 40 words, 10 each
from four conceptual categories. He proposed that
If retrieval and recognition processes can be sep
arated as neatly as the dual process theory Implies,
organization of the learning material can have no
effect upon recognition, since organization facili
tates retrieval and retrieval in recognition is
trivial [p. 235].
Using a high organization list and a low organization list
made from frequency of response norms, his results indi
cated that a highly significant number of words was
recalled from the high organization list. When a recogni
tion test was given, memory strength as estimated by the
d' statistic was nearly identical for the two lists. In a
second experiment, CVC trigrams were constructed so that
they would be highly predictable (High Structure) or unpre
dictable (Low Structure) . Intra-list similarity was also
varied by using either 5 or 10 different consonants to
construct the set of CVC’s, The results indicated that
high intra-list similarity decreased performance
for both recognition and recall, but did not inter
act with list structure. List structure signifi
cantly facilitated recall, but had little effect
upon recognition [p. 236].
These data support the hypothesis that recall
involves a retrieval phase and that an organized list iB
easier to retrieve than an unorganized one, but that
recognition does not require retrieval and is therefore
independent of list organization (Kintsch, 1970).
Tulving (1968) has attempted to specify the
35
circumstances under which recall is higher than recogni
tion. After learning a liBt of 48 paired words (A-B pairs),
subjects were given a recognition test for B members of
the pairs. Using two different lists each subject trained
until he could anticipate all 48 B members correctly.
Each subject was then given a sheet of paper containing
the 96 B members of List 1 and List 2 and was asked to
check off the words he had just learned. The results
indicated that among the 48 words the subjects had been
able to recall in the presence of A words, they were unable
to recognize approximately 4 .6 of the items. It appears,
therefore, that it is possible for subjects to recall
learned items even if they cannot identify them as old
items in a recognition test. This experiment, however,
used "cuing" as a tool. Tulving (1968) concluded that:
Recall cannot be higher than recognition as long
as retrieval cues are different in the two test
situations. Recall is higher than recognition
whenever retrieval cues present at the recall test
are more effective in providing access to stored
information than are retrieval cues present at the
recognition test [p. 5 4],
Some researchers state that "recognition does
not require retrieval" (Schonfield & Robertson, 1966) or
that the basic difference between the two processes is
that recall involves a search process and recognition does
not. As Tulving pointed out,
If recognition performance depends not only on the
amount and organization of information in the mem
ory store, but also on the number of retrieval cues
36
present, at the time of the recognition test . . .
then it becomes necessary for students of memory to
worry about retrieval problems in recognition tests
as it is necessary in situations when memory 1b
tested with different kinds of recall tests [p. 5^].
Slamecka (1967) pointed out the different opera
tions involved in recognition and recall:
When memory for a list is tested by having S choose,
from a larger set only those items which were in
the list, the performance affords a measure of dis
crimination of list measurement. In effect, the
larger set is subdivided into Items from the list,
and all otherB ....
The procedure of free recall, on the other hand,
Imposes an additional requirement. Not only must
correct items be discriminated from others which
come to mind, but they must also be available on
an unaided basis. That is, they must exiBt in S's
repertoire as integrated units, able to be produced,
so that they can be discriminated from Incorrect
ones. Such unaided availability Is not required
for recognition tasks since the itemB are available
on the recognition sheet [p. 187]•
It would appear, therefore, that the basic dif
ference between the two measures is that in recall a bur
den is placed on the retrieval mechanism since no cue is
available to facilitate recall, but In recognition the
search and retrieval process is finitely limited to a few
choices.
Davis, Sutherland, and Judd (1961) suggested
that recognition scores are higher than recall because of
the fewer alternatives to choose from In recognition.
They hypothesized that the amount of information that is
actually transmitted Is the same. By calculating the
amount of Information transmitted by each subject,
37
It was found that at leaBt as much Information was
transmitted In recall as in recognition and that
the amount of information transmitted in the recog
nition conditions tended to Increase aB the number
of alternatives from which the selection was made
[p. 4 2 9].
Postman (1950) varied systematically the number
of alternatives among which the £ 3 must choose during a
recognition test. The results Indicated that as the num
ber of alternatives increases, the corrected recognition
scores get progressively lower but not in a linear manner.
It appears that the efficiency of recognition varies
inversely with the number of choices, but the relationship
is stepwise rather than continuous.
Brown and Routh (1968), using a recognition test
Involving the same number of permissible choices as recall,
found that recognition was Btill higher in all cases but
that there was a trend for the two scores to converge when
the number of choices for both became sufficiently high.
Kintsch and Morris (1965) had their Ss learn a
list of nonsense syllables by the methods of recognition
and recall. They also had another group of Ss first learn
to recognize a liBt of nonsense syllables and then recall
them. Their resulting recognition data could be explained
by a simple 2-state Markov model, but a 3-Btate Markov
model was needed for the description of the recall data.
However, when recall learning takes place after recognition
38
learning, the results can actually be described by a
2-state Markov model.
Lachman and Field (1965) have shown that only at
the early stages of serial verbal learning is recognition
superior to recall. Their resultB indicated that recogni
tion is superior only during the initial stages of learn
ing. They suggested that previous experiments of the
superiority of recognition are an artifact of multiple
choice tests which may reflect the elimination of incor
rect alternatives rather than the recognition of correct
alternatives.
Brown (1965), comparing recognition and recall
by a multiple choice method, has come to a similar conclu
sion as Lachman and Field. He suggested that the tradi
tional method of testing the two exaggerates the difference
between them. Using the relation between confidence and
the probability of success, it was found that in the
recall task the success rate was much higher. Brown con
cluded that the inferiority in recall is due to a failure
to scan the possibilities effectively.
Slamecka (1967)j using a 20-item list of words
under three levels of item population Bize (stimulus
uncertainty), found that there was no difference between
recall and full recognition but that retention was
affected by stimulus uncertainty. The effects of succes
sive tests on the same material were also examined. The
39
results suggest that recall Is not facilitated following
either recognition procedure.
What is proposed in the first study is a more
stringent test of the hypothesis that retrieval processes
become less efficient with age. It is hypothesized that
recognition will show an increasing superiority over recall
with advancing age and that under the cued recall condition
the differences between the scores of the young and old
subjects will be less than the scores under the free recall
condition. The important implication of this study is that
the retrieval mechanism, and not the storage mechanism, is
faulty in the elderly individual.
Cued Recall
Tulving and Pearlstone (1966), using "category
cues," showed that failure to recall an item does not
necessarily mean that the trace is no longer available but
that there is a failure to find that trace. They pointed
out that forgetting "does not necessarily reflect the loss
of relevant Information from the store, but only its inac
cessibility [p. 389]•" Their results indicate that under
a cued recall condition, recall is higher than under a
non-cued condition.
Rothkopf and Coke (1961) showed that "the fre
quency of recall of individual words within a list is at
40
least in part determined by the number of list words (No)
for which the word in question is normally given as an
association response [p. 4 3 7]." It was also noted "that
the frequency with which a word is recalled immediately
after one of Its ’cues' is an increasing function of the
number of 'cues' for the word in question [p. 4 3 7]."
LIndley (1965) showed that "recoding cues" had a
facilitating effect on memory. These recoding cues give
the subject extra information upon which to make a deci
sion. The cues act as mediators to reduce the number of
"chunks" of Information to be stored In the memory.
Lawrence (1967) increased the number of cues In
a free recall experiment by presenting her old and young
subjects (mean ages 75 and 20) with a 36-word list, com
posed of six words In each of six categories. The results
showed that if the Bubjects received the cues Just before
recall, the scores of the old subjects were almost the
same as those of the young subjects.
LIndley (1963)^ using controlled cuing on a
short-term memory task, found that recoding cues facili
tated STM with low meaningfulness, but that they interfered
with STM with high meaningfulness. LIndley suggested that
recoding and decoding cues play an important role In STM
processes when cues are available to control these proc
esses .
41
LIndley and Nedler (1965).. using a technique
similar to that of Peterson and Peterson (1959)* found
that recoding cues in either order facilitated trigram
recall.
Tulving and Oster (1968), studying the effective
ness of retrieval cues, had their subjects learn lists of
24 to-be-remembered (TBR) words. Each TBR word was either
presented with a cue word or without a cue word on a
single input trial. The results indicated that recall was
facilitated when the cue word was presented at either the
input or input-output stage but had no effect when it was
presented only at the output end.
Freeman and Landauer (1966), using cuing as a
method of facilitating retrieval from long-term memory
(LTM), have demonstrated the significant facilitating
effects of presenting the initial letter of the correct
answer as compared to the incorrect initial letter or with
no cue at all.
Cramer (1966)* testing the effects of mediated
priming on associative responses, found that when the
primary words were followed immediately by the cue stim
ulus word the probability of occurrence of the desired
response significantly increased.
Both Storms (1958) and Cofer (1969) have shown
that by presenting B words just prior to an association
42
test the associative strength of an A-B pair can be tempo
rarily increased.
Howes and Osgood (1954) have also demonstrated
that by presenting associately-related words just prior to
each stimulus word the frequency of a class of responses
was significantly increased.
Brown and McNeill (1966), studying the "tip of
the tongue" phenomenon, showed that we do not store the
complete word but attend chiefly to the initial and final
letters of a word and store these. It appears that Ss are
more aware of various characteristics of the TBR words,
generic recall, and are many times unable to recall the
word, but can recognize the word if it is shown to them.
Mandler, Pearlstone, and Kipman (1969) have
shown that the number of categories in organized lists
determines the number of words recalled. The number of
categories also influences recognition both in immediate
tests and in delayed tests given two weeks later. When
using synonyms as fillers the results indicated that this
had little effect on the false alarm rates, suggesting that
perceptual features of words are used at least in addition
to semantic features. It was also found that with each
new category approximately five new words could be
recalled.
Freund and Underwood (1970); using a descriptive
adjective adjacent to each noun, presented a list of 30
43
words to their Ss with the instructions to remember the
noun. Their results indicated that cuing was very effec
tive when the cue occurred on the study trial adjacent to
the TBR word.
Drachman and Leavitt (1972) compared a young
group of Ss to an old group of Ss on a number of memory
dimensions. Their results showed that retrieval from old
storage and immediate memory span are affected little by
age but showed highly significant impairment in learning
of supra-span digits and verbal items. The effects of
cuing were also studied, and while cuing facilitated recall
for both the young and old groups the cued recall advantage
was no greater for the aged.
It can be readily ascertained from the following
studies that cuing has a positive effect on retrieval and
that recall deficits in old age appear to be more of a
retrieval problem than a storage phenomenon.
Incidental and Intentional Learning
Incidental learning has been defined as "learning
which apparently takes place without a specific motive or
a special formal instruction and set to learn the activity
or material in question [McGeoch, 1952]." Thus, in the
incidental learning (INC) of verbal material, typically
Ss are instructed to react to or operate on certain
44
dimensions of the stimulus material and are then tested
for retention on other dimensions.
In early investigations of INC learning, the con
cept of set was employed as a central explanatory con
struct. In the INC learning situation, the subject
apparently learns in the absence of an experimental set to
learn. In contrast, a set to learn always characterizes
intentional (INT) learning. Even in recent experimental
work the selector mechanism which produces differences
between relevant (INT) and irrelevant (INC) learning is
sometimes classed under the heading set (McLaughlin, 19^5)•
Merely not instructing subjects to learn does
not, however, preclude the possibility of a set to learn
(Bahrick, Pitts, & Rankin, 1952). Because of the diffi
culty of handling the concept of set operationally, it
seems preferable not to define INC learning In terms of
set, intent, or motive to learn (McGuigan, 1958). One
approach has been merely to regard learning as INC if
there are no formal instructions to learn the particular
(INC) material, and INT if there are formal instructions
to learn the (INT) material.(McLaughlin, 19^5).
Experimental Procedures
Two basic experimental methods have evolved in
the study of INC learning (Kausler & Trapp, i960), and a
45
third method which combines these two basic designs has
been used in recent studies.
Type I design. The first procedure requires sub
jects in the INC group to learn material when they are not
specifically instructed to do so. These subjects are
directed toward the task by some orienting instruction—
such as encircling the items or making free associations—
but are given no instructions to learn. The subjects in
the INT group* on the other hand* learn the task with
specific instructions to learn. After exposure to the
material* subjects in the INC condition are given an unex
pected test of recognition.
Type II design. In the Type II design INC
learners appear to learn associations which they are not
instructed to learn during a period when they are learning
other associations which they have been instructed to
learn (Feldman & Underwood* 1957)• In this design each
subject serves as his own control for both INT and INC
learning.
Mixed design. Several recent studies have used
a "mixed" design employing both Type I and Type II pro
cedures. The mixed design allows comparison within single
studies of INC learning with and without Instructions to
learn INT material (McLaughlin* 19^5)•
Orienting Task
In a study of INC learning the experimental
arrangement must be such as to insure the exposure of the
subject to the learning material. The particular procedure
used for this purpose constitutes the orienting task. To
be useful, an orienting task must satisfy two criteria:
(l) it must create conditions which make it certain that
the subject perceives the INC stimulus materials; and (2)
it should minimize the development of uncontrolled sets to
learn. The requirement of an orienting taBk raises impor
tant problems of control and interpretation in the experi
mental analysis of incidental learning.
Postman (1964) discussed the various types of
orienting tasks employed in INC learning studies for both
the Type I and the Type II designs; and the methodological
problems raised by variations in orienting tasks. To ex
plain experimental findings in which the difference
between amount of INT and INC learning was minimal; Post
man (1964) conceptualized a continuum of orienting tasks
ranging from those requiring responses maximally favorable
to learning to those requiring responses maximally unfavor
able. At either extreme on the continuum the differences
between INT and INC learning are minimal. Thus; at the
favorable extreme INC learning increases through generali
zation, while at the unfavorable extreme INT learning
47
decreases because of interference from the orienting ac
tivity .
Substantial differences in amount of recall can
be produced by varying stimulus materials., and ordinarily
these differences in the organization imposed by subjects
on the material recalled. Such recall-facilitating organi
zation is variously referred to as secondary organization,
subjective organization, clustering, and so on. In gen
eral, it appears that meaningful relations (taxonomic
classes, logical classes, and prior associate relations)
lead to well-organized recall.
A problem of particular interest now is the
elucidation of the mechanisms which bring this organiza
tion about. If, along with Melton (1963)* we conceptualize
the memory sequence as trace formation, trace storage, and
trace retrieval, a first step in choosing among mechanisms
might be: Where in this input, storage, and output model
shall we suppose the organization occurs?
Some studies have assumed that the organization
takes place via mediation during the activity of recall
Itself. This view, which was explicitly advanced by
Jenkins and Russell (1952), holds that once a word is re
called, It acts as an auxiliary stimulus to help elicit
another word on the list.
Tulving (1962, 1964, 1966), on the other hand,
viewed such organization as a storage phenomenon, with the
48
list of items being stored under higher order units cor
responding to the relations existing in the stimulus lists.
Organization in free recall reflects the organization
within the memory storage itself.
Cohen (1966) and Slamecka (1968) suggested mech
anisms of still a different sort. That is, Slamecka
postulated that traces of individual items are stored
independently, but that the subject also encodes some gen
eral representation of the list structure as a retrieval
plan or strategy which guides the recall of the items.
Highly organized Btimulus lists produce greater recall and
more organization because they are more amenable to some
highly organized and efficient retrieval plan or strategy.
Both Cofer (1965) and Tulving (1968) suggested
that it might be profitable to vary the intra-experimental
situation and look for differences in organization of
recall while holding the stimulus materials constant. If
large and consistent differences in organization can be
produced with intra-experlmental manipulation, it may be
possible to separate the roles played by encoding, storage,
and retrieval in the production of organization. The
present study is an effort in that direction.
Postman, Adams, and Bohm (1956) compared the
recall of high strength primary associates in the groups
that performed Incidental tasks during presentation of the
49
words. The Ss whose task it was to rate the words aB to
frequency of usage in English showed lower recall than Ss
given standard recall instructions.
In general, intentional learning is found to he
superior to incidental learning. A number of investigators
have shown, however, that the superiority of intentional
over incidental learning depends upon such factors as the
nature of the orienting task accompanying incidental
learning (Postman & Adams, 1956), whether or not the in
tentional subject is also required to perform an orienting
task (Gleitman & Gillett, 1957)> the number of presenta
tions of the stimulus material (Gleitman & Gillett, 1957),
the rate of stimulus presentation (Rosenberg, 1959)j and
the meaningfulness of the stimulus material (Postman 8c
Adams, 1956). Proper variation of one or a number of the
above factors results in no differences between inten
tional and incidental learning.
Schneider and Kintz (1965) had five groups of
subjects perform five different orienting tasks, each of
which included an incidental and intentional learning
condition. By means of instruction, subjects' degree of
attention to the learning material was regulated. The
amount of learning, regardless of the categorization as
incidental or intentional, varied more as a function of
experimentally induced attention than as a function of
intent to learn. Their conclusion was that intentional
50
and incidental learning are functions of essentially the
same process* one which necessarily involves an instruction
stimulus* an orienting task* and attention to the learning
material.
Hyde and Jenkins (1969) found that when the words
in a randomized list of strong word associates were en
countered as semantic units* incidental recall and organi
zation (clustering) were facilitated. Their incidental-
semantic subjects performed as well as their intentional
subjects who were not given an orienting task. Presumably*
semantic coding led to chunking of the associates during
Btorage, which in turn facilitated clustering in recall as
well as recall itself. In related experiments by Bobrow
and Bower (1969)> incidental (cued) recall of words from
sentences was facilitated by orienting tasks that were
designed to emphasize sentence comprehension. In addition
incidental-comprehension subjects performed as well as
intentional learners.
Rosenberg and Schiller (1971) used a series of
12 sentences containing strong normative semantic con
straints presented to independent groups of subjects under
three conditions. A recall task made it possible to
measure organization. An incidental-non-semantic group
performed a task that oriented them toward the sentences
as collections of letters (letter estimation), while an
Incidental-semantic group was given a task that oriented
them toward the sentences as semantic units (familiarity-
rating) . Intentions-only subjects were asked to try to
memorize the sentences. Their results Indicated that the
incidental-non-semantic group was inferior to the other
groups in the tendency to recall sentences in an all or
none fashion and in sentence and word recall as well. The
incidental-semantic and Intentional-only groups did not
differ on any of the measures. Some evidence has been
presented by Rosenberg and Jarvella (1970) that Incidental
learning of words from sentences of the type used in the
preceding experiment is facilitated when the demands of
the task are such as to increase the level of attention to
the Input and Its meanings.
It is clear from the results of these studies
that when incidental subjects were led to encode seman
tically sentences containing strong normative-semantic
constraints, within-sentence organization and sentence and
word recall were greatly facilitated. It is likely, there
fore, that the unit of memory under this condition was the
whole sentence. The importance of semantic coding in
memory, however, Is even more strongly underscored by the
findings for the Incidental-semantic and Intentions-only
conditions. The fact that the intentional learners did
not surpass the intentional-semantic subjects on any of
the measures strongly suggests that the main contribution
52
to learning efficiency of the intent to memorize the sen
tences was semantic coding during input. A similar view
has been expressed by Bobrow and Bower (1969).
Wimer (1960), using both incidental and inten
tional conditions, had his Ss learn a word-color relation
ship. Subjects under the incidental task were told that
the experiment was concerned with the effects of word
color on reading speed. They were told to read each word
as fast as possible. In the intentional task the Ss were
informed that they would be tested after the experiment as
to the specific color in which each word was printed. The
results indicated that the young intentional group was
superior to all other groups. In the absence of instruc
tion to learn, there was no age difference in the amount
of learning which occurred. While the performance of
young subjects improved under the condition of instruction
to learn, the performance of the older subjects did not.
Hollingsworth (1913)^ in a study to find the
characteristic differences between recall and recognition,
found that mere repetition did not guarantee the subsequent
ability to recall information unless there was an intent or
purpose to retain the information. Hollingsworth found
that the influence of intention in the case of recognition
was much less than in the case of recall (incidental learn
ing) . He also noted that primary and recency influenced
53
the accuracy of recognition In much the same way that they
Influence recall.
Estes and DaPalito (1967) presented to their Ss,
under either intentional or incidental training, a list of
paired associate items. The Ss were then tested by either
a recall test or a recognition test. The results showed
that recognition scores indicated very little difference in
the amount learned following incidental as compared to the
Intentional training condition. They concluded that since
initial tests revealed large decrements in performance fol
lowing Incidental training "that recall performance in
volves a retrieval process which can be modified independ
ently of the Information storage required for recognition
performance [p. 167]."
Although the Investigations reviewed in this
paper -are experimental studies of human learning in lab
oratory situations, work in the area of incidental learning
has Important implications for clinical and social psychol
ogy. Aborn (1953), for example, has demonstrated that the
Incidental learning procedure is more sensitive to the
effects of anxiety-produced repression than are tradi
tional (intentional) procedures. Bandura and Huston (1961)
reported an experiment in which identification in children
was conceptualized as a procesB of Incidental learning.
Bousfield, Cowan, and Steward (1963) and Yavuz (1963)
reported evidence that connotatively meaningful evaluative
54
responses are incidentally learned to stimulus objects.
This confirms clinical and everyday experiences which
indicate that failure to recall the name of a person or a
verbal label of an object does not necessarily preclude
the possibility of making valid evaluative statements
regarding the person or object (Yavuz, 1963). In general,
it Is likely Berlyne (i960) was correct In feeling that by
far the greater part of a man's learning experience in
volves what is technically incidental learning (McLaughlin,
1965).
The second and third experiment will employ both
an intentional as well as an incidental task(s) so as to
have greater control over the processing activities of the
subjects. It is hypothesized that little difference will
be found between the incidental scores of the young and
old subjects but that significant differences will be found
under Intentional learning.
Theories of Memory Loss in the Aged
Three main theories have been postulated that try
to explain memory loss. The most prominent are the "plas
ticity" theory and the theory of disuse. Another theory
that has received little attention involves a decline In
attention or motivation to learn.
The plasticity theory ascribes the decline in
learning ability to decreased modifiability of the nervous
55
system. It postulates that since learning is basically a
physical alteration that takes place in the brain with
age, there is a slowing in speed of these physical changes
which results in a loss in learning ability. Thorndike
(1928), Ruch (193*0* and Hebb (1942) were three proponents
of this hypothesis. Korchin and Basowitz (1957) also
supported the plasticity theory. Their results indicated
that there is a greater loss for less familiar materials.
These findings are consistent with the prediction that
more familiar material would require less extensive struc
tural changes in the nervous system and therefore would be
less difficult for the aged to learn (Wimer, i960).
The second major explanation for the loss in
learning ability is "disuse1 ' or the lack of practice in a
learning situation found in many older people. Thorndike
(1928) considered disuse an important factor and the work
of Harlow (1949) on learning setB gave more credence to
this theory.
The third major explanation is one that has not
received much attention in the past. This theory states
that motivation and attention are less acute with age.
The present experiment will systematically study
the effects of different orienting tasks on amount and
kind of learning as a means of determining the efficacy of
different learning plans. The advantage of this approach
56
lies in the fact that all subjects in a given experimental
condition would carry out the same operation. The opera
tions comprising that orienting task leading to superior
learning could then be said to constitute an effective
learning plan for a given memory response. Also, this
method will be a sensitive measure of the difference found
between young and old subjects on free recall tasks. An
answer to the question, "Where does the breakdown in the
memory mechanism take place?" will hopefully be given by
comparing the young and old subjects under the different
learning conditions (intentional, incidental) using spe
cific orienting tasks.
CHAPTER II
STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
The purpose of these three experiments was to
investigate memory processes as a function of (a) age
(young and old), (b) type of retention test (free recall,
cued recall, and recognition), and (c) learning condition
(incidental or intentional).
The first experiment is concerned with retrieval
processes in memory. Many studies have assessed the influ
ence of interference and decay on memory storage, but few
have studied retrieval processes per se. In the first
study retrieval is measured by free recall, cued recall,
and recognition test scores.
Schonfield (19&5) made the assumption that only
recall and not recognition requires retrieval from storage.
His results supported this hypothesis by showing no age-
related differences in recognition scores but a consistent
drop in recall scores with age. Tulving (1968), on the
other hand, stated that both operations require a search
and retrieval process. In recall, the search is unaided
and depends on such factors as being able to discriminate
the correct items from others which come to mind. In
57
58
recognition, the search and retrieval process is aided by
a cue and culminates when the search turns up a stored
item which matches the criterion stimulus.
In another study, Tulving and Pearlstone (1966),
using "category cues," showed that "sufficiently intact
memory traces of many words not recalled under noncued
recall conditions were available to the memory storage,
but not accessible for retrieval [p. 381]."
If it can be shown that cued recall and recogni
tion scores show little deterioration with age, but that
free recall scores show a significant decline with age,
then it is suggested that the phenomenon of lowered test
scores with age in a free recall task is attributable to a
faulty retrieval process rather than to a faulty storage
process.
The second and third experiments are attempts to
differentiate different levels of memory processing so as
to determine where the breakdown in the memory mechanism
occurs.
A problem of particular Interest is the elucida
tion of the mechanisms which bring about successful
retention. If, along with Melton (1983)^ we conceptualize
the memory sequence as trace formation, trace storage, and
trace retrieval, a first step in choosing among mechanisms
might be: Where In this Input, storage, and output model
shall we suppose the organization occurs? Some studies
59
have assumed that the organization takes place via media
tion during the activity of recall itself (Jenkins &
Russell, 1952). Tulving (1962), however, viewed such
organization as a storage phenomenon with the list of items
being stored under higher order units corresponding to the
relations existing in the stimulus lists. Slamecka (1968)
postulated that traces of individual items are stored
independently, but that the subject also encodes some gen
eral representation of the list structure as a retrieval
plan or strategy which guides the recall of the items.
In order to test these various positions it
might be profitable to vary the intra-experimental situa
tion and look for differences in organization of recall
while holding the stimulus material constant. If large
and consistent differences in organization can be produced
with intra-experimental manipulations, it may be possible
to separate the roles played by encoding, storage, and
retrieval in the production of organization. The second
and third experiments are attempts to do this.
Hypotheses
The following directional hypotheses were tested:
1. There will be age differences in the number
of words correctly recalled in the free re
call task, specifically, the young subjects
will recall more words than the old.
60
2. There will he a significant increase in re
call scores for both the young and old
groups under the cued recall condition.
3. There will be a drop in performance of
both groups tested on free recall under
the incidental learning condition.
4. There will be a significant difference be
tween recognition test scores for the two
age groups.
5. There will be significant interaction ef
fects between the condition, age, and type
of test.
CHAPTER III
DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY OP
THE FIRST EXPERIMENT
Intentional Learning
Subjects
Fifty females, 25 in each of two age groups, par
ticipated in the experiment. The older Ss (mean age 58.2)
were staff members of a local college. The young Ss (mean
age 20.4) were students in a sophomore-level psychology
class. Both the old and young Ss were in good physical
health and free of visual and auditory defects.
Material
A list of 20 words was administered to each £3.
These items were obtained from a table of words used by
Bahrick (1969) his study on prompted recall. The 20
words that were to be learned were the response words in
his PA list. A list of 20 "prompter" words was also
selected from among the five levels of prompters. A
prompter probability level of .61-.86 was used in this
study under the cued recall condition.
6l
Procedure
The 50 Ss were tested individually in a quiet
laboratory. Each S was seated at a table opposite E. The
£ 5 was then given a piece of paper and a pencil and told
that she would be given 20 words. Each word was then pre
sented one at a time with a 4-second exposure rate using
an inter-trial interval of 5 secondB. The words were
printed in block letters 2 inches high on 4" x 6M white
index cards. The learning task took a total of 3 minutes.
When the learning task was completed the S_ was asked to
write down in any order as many of the 20 words as she
could remember. Each S_ was given 3 minutes to complete the
task. When this was completed E collected the paper and
this concluded the free recall portion of the experiment.
The second part of the experiment was adminis
tered after a 5-minute break. The was given another
piece of paper with the instructions that she would be
given a "cue" word that should prompt a response to one of
the words on the original list. Each cue word was then
verbally given one at a time with a 15-second interval
between each presentation. The S_ was told to write down
the correct response to each cue. When the 20 cue words
had been administered, the answer sheet was collected.
This ended the cued recall portion of the experiment.
The third part of the experiment was adminis
tered after another 5-minute break. The £ was given
another piece of paper with the numbers 1 through 20 on it.
After each number there were four words lettered A, B, C,
and D. The £ 3 was told to circle the correct word after
each number that corresponded to the word given in the
original list. Each S was given 5 minutes to complete the
recognition portion of the experiment. When this was com
pleted the experiment was over.
Following the completion of the experiment each
S_ was told that the purpose of the study was to find out
the effect that cuing has on the recall of forgotten words.
CHAPTER IV
RESULTS OF THE FIRST EXPERIMENT
Intentional Learning
Figure 1 shows the mean scores of the young and
old age groups on each of the three memory tests (Free
Recall, Cued Recall, and Recognition) . Each mean Is
bounded by its 95 percent confidence interval.
It will be noted that there was a significant
difference between the old and young age groups on both the
free recall and cued recall tasks. In the free recall task
the younger Ss performed significantly better than the
older Ss (t, 48 = 7.1* p<0.00l). Likewise in the cued
recall task the younger Ss performed better than the older
Ss but the difference between the means was much smaller
in the two age groups and just reached the significance
level (t, 48 = 2.55* p<0.05). It should also be noted
that there was a marked Improvement in scores for both the
young and old age groupB under the cued recall and recog
nition test conditions.
A look at Figure 1 shows that the young Sb 1 mean
score for the cued recall test was 18.2 and that the mean
score for the recognition test was 19-8. It will also be
64
65
20
15 —
10
Old
Young
5 —
Free Cued Recognition
Recall Recall
Fig. 1. A plot of cell means of the young and old
age group. Each point is bound by its 95$
confidence interval.
66
TABLE 1
EXPERIMENT I
MEAN NUMBER OF WORDS FREE RECALLED, CUE RECALLED,
AND RECOGNIZED
(Intentional Learning)
N = 50
Free Cued
Condition Recall Recall Recognition
Young
14.3 18.2 19.8
Old
9.7 17.1 19.7
67
noted that the old Ss1 mean score for the cued recall test
was 17-1 and that the mean score for the recognition test
was 19*7. It can be seen that the differences between
these scores are small. On the free recall test., however,
the mean score for the old age group was 9-7 and the mean
score for the young age group was 14.3j which was highly
significant (pCO.OOl). This test required the material
to be both stored and then retrieved without the aid of
cues in order for a correct answer to be recorded. The
older group showed a distinctive loss on this free recall
task.
The results also indicate a large range of scores
for both the old and the young groups. Consequently, this
resulted in greater variability In the mean scores with
the younger group showing the most variability under the
free recall condition and the older group showing the most
variability under the cued recall and recognition condi
tions.
CHAPTER V
DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY OP
THE SECOND EXPERIMENT
Incidental Learning
Subjects
One hundred and twenty female subjects, 60 in
each of two age groups, were randomly assigned to one of
three experimental conditions. The older group were staff
members of a local college or participants in the Summer
Institute at the University of Southern California. The
young subjects were students from an introductory psychol
ogy class. Both young and old subjects were in good
physical health and free from visual and auditory defects.
Material
A list of 20 words was administered to each sub
ject. These items were obtained from a table of words
used by Bahrick (1969) in his study on prompted recall.
The 20 words that were to be learned were the response
words in his PA list. A list of 20 "prompter'' words was
also selected from among the five levels of prompters. A
prompter probability level of .61-.86 was used in this
study under the cued recall condition.
68
6 9
Each word was presented on a 5" x 7" white card
with 2-inch black letters.
Procedure
Each of the 120 subjects was tested individually.
She was told that E was interested in word usage and
wanted to know if she could recognize what part of speech
each word was that she was going to view (e.g., noun,
adjective, adverb, and so forth). Each subject was then
given an answer sheet numbered 1 through 20 with the fol
lowing written and oral directions:
You will hear and see a total of twenty words. Af
ter each word is read to you mark in the appropriate
space on your answer sheet the letter N if the word
is a noun, the letter A if the word is an adjective
or adverb. Some words are both nouns and adverbs.
In such a caBe put NV. The word will be read rather
quickly. If you miss a word just go on to the next
space.
The subject was led to believe that E wanted to
know whether she was familiar with the various parts of
speech and had no idea that she would be required to recall
the words given to her.
The words were then presented one at a time
using a 5-second presentation rate with a 4-second inter
trial interval. The total presentation time was approx
imately three minutes. As soon as E finished presenting
the series of 20 words E collected the answer sheet and
gave the subject another answer sheet numbered 1 through
20 with the following instructions:
70
Please recall as many of the twenty words that were
Just presented to you, in any order, and write them
down on this answer sheet.
Each subject was allowed a total of 5 minutes to
recall the words but under most circumstances very few
words were recalled after one minute. When time was up E
collected the answer sheets and the subject received
another answer sheet. The instructions read as follows:
You will hear twenty words read to you one at a
time. Each one of these words should help you re
call one of the original words given to you. In
other words, each cue-word has some associate
strength with the original word. Are there any
questions?
E then read each cue word to the subject at the
rate of one word every five seconds. After all 20 cue
words had been presented E collected the answer sheets.
The last part of the experiment was then con
ducted. Each subject received another answer sheet num
bered 1 through 20 with three alternatives plus the orig
inal word. The directions read as follows:
This is a multiple choice type test. Please circle
the original word that was given to you at the be
ginning of the experiment. Out of the eighty alter
natives only twenty will be the original words.
The subject was again given 5 minutes to do this
task. When the subject was finished E collected her
answer sheet and this ended the experiment. E then ex
plained the purpose of the experiment to the subject.
CHAPTER VI
RESULTS OP THE SECOND EXPERIMENT
Incidental Learning
Figure 2 and Table 2 show the mean scores of the
young and old age groups on each of the three memory tests
(Free Recall, Cued Recall, and Recognition) under the inci
dental learning condition. Each mean is bounded by its 95
percent confidence interval.
It will be noted that under the free recall con
dition the young and old subjects did not differ on their
mean scores. It should be noted, however, that the
younger subjects demonstrated more variability In their
scores with an S.D. of 2.70 as compared to an S.D. of 2.43
for the older subjects in the free recall task. Under the
cued recall task, the younger subjects performed slightly
better than the older subjects but the difference was far
from being significant. Likewise in the recognition task
the mean scores were very similar with no significant dif
ferences being found.
It should be noted that there was a marked Im
provement in scores for both the young and old age groups
under the cued recall and recognition conditions.
71
72
20--
15 —
10
Old
Young
5 —
Free Cued Recognition
Recall Recall
Fig. 2. A plot of cell means of the young and old
age group. Each point is bound by its 95$
confidence interval.
TABLE 2
EXPERIMENT II
MEAN NUMBER OF WORDS FREE RECALLED, CUE RECALLED,
AND RECOGNIZED
(incidental Learning)
N = 120
Free Cued
Condition Recall Recall Recognition
Young
7-75 17.14
19.86
Old
7.75
16.70
19.79
74
A look at Table 2 shows that the young subjects'
mean score on the cued recall test was 17.14 and that the
mean score on the recognition test was 19.86. It can also
be seen that the old subjects' mean score for the cued
recall test was 16.70 and that the mean score for the
recognition test was 19-79* It can be seen that the dif
ferences between these scores are small. These results
are all very similar to those of Experiment I except the
mean scores on the free recall test. The results of
Experiment I showed significant differences between the
young and old subjects on the free recall test under in
tentional learning. Under incidental learning, however,
no differences were found between the two groups. The
means for both the young and old subjects were 7-75- This
test required the material to be both stored and retrieved,
but unlike Experiment I the subject had no Idea that she
was going to be required to recall the words at a later
time. Why no difference is found between young and old
subjects on a free recall task under Incidental learning is
an Interesting question. It will be discussed later in
this paper In detail.
The results also Indicate a large range of scores
for both young and old subjects with results similar to
those found in Experiment I. Under the free recall
condition greater variability was found in the scores for
the younger group, with the older subjects demonstrating
the most variability under the cued recall and recognition
conditions.
CHAPTER VII
DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY OF
THE THIRD EXPERIMENT
Intentional and Incidental Learning
Subject^
(
One hundred and twenty female subjectB, 60 In
each of two age groups, were randomly assigned to one of
12 experimental conditions. The older group were staff
members at a local college or participants in the Summer
Institute at the University of Southern California. The
young subjects were students from a sophomore-level psy
chology class. Both young and old subjects were in good
physical health and free from visual and auditory defects.
Material
A list of 20 wordB was presented to each group of
five subjects. These words were obtained from a table of
words used by Bahrick (1969) in his study on prompted
recall. The 20 words that were to be learned were the
response words in his PA list. Three lists of 20
"prompter1 1 words were selected from the five levels of
prompters. Prompter probability levels of .01-.08, .23-
76
77
.36, and .61-.86 were uBed in this study under the three
different cued recall conditions.
Each word was presented on a 5" x 7" white card
with 2-inch black letters.
Procedure
Each group of subjects received a list of 20
words. Each group was told that it was going to partici
pate in an experiment having to do with words. They were
asked not to discuss the instruction sheet given to them.
They were told to do the best they could and were not
allowed to ask any questions unless they had to do with the
written instructions. Each group of subjects received one
of the three sets of instructions:
The intentional group received the following
instructions:
You will hear a list of 20 words. Try to remember
the words since you will be asked to recall them
afterwards. Do not write the word down.
The intentional with orienting task group were
given the following instructions:
You will hear a list of 20 words. After each word
is read, mark in the appropriate space below the
letter N if the word is a noun* the letter Y if
the word is a verb., and the letter A if the word
iB either an adjective or adverb. Some words are
both nouns and verbs. In Buch a case put NY. The
words will be read rather quickly. If you miss a
word, just go on to the next space. In addition to
the above task, also try to remember the words since
you will be asked to recall them afterwards. Do not
write the words down.
78
The incidental group were given the following
instructions t
You will hear a list of 20 words. After each word
is read mark in the appropriate space below the
letter N if the word is a noun, the letter V if
the word is a verb, or the letter A if the word is
either an adjective or adverb. Some words are both
nouns and verbs. In such cases put NY. The words
will be read rather quickly. If you miss a word
just go on to the next space. Do not write the
word down.
After the words had been presented under one of
the three learning conditions the same procedure that was
used in Experiments I and II followed.
CHAPTER VIII
RESULTS OF THE THIRD EXPERIMENT
Intentional and Incidental Learning
Table 3 shows the mean scones of the young and
old age groups on each of the three memory conditions under
the four levels of recall.
The three-way analysis of variance called for by
the experimental design found significant main effects for
age* F (I* 118) = 28.7; for learning conditions* F (2, 118)
=9.2; and for prompter probability levels* F (3* 118) =
171-6. All F values exceeded the .001 level of signifi
cance (Table 4).
It should be noted that significant differences
were also found between the young and old age groups on the
intentional (_t* 8 = 3*16* p < .05) and incidental with ori
enting task (t_* 8 = 4.2* p < .05) learning conditions under
the free recall task. The only other significant differ
ence between the young and old age groups under the inten
tional learning condition was found using the prompter
probability level of .23 (t_* 8 = 1.97^ p < .05).
79
80
TABLE 3
EXPERIMENT III
MEAN NUMBER OF WORDS RECALLED UNDER THE THREE LEARNING
CONDITIONS, PROMPTER PROBABILITY LEVELS, AND AGE
Incidental with
Condition Intentional Orienting Task Incidental
FR
(Y) 14.2 13.0 7.4
(0) 9.2 8.2 7.2
.61
(Y) 17.6 16.0 17.0
(0)
16.8 16.0 16 . 2
.23
(Y)
10.8 8.8 8.6
(0)
7.8 7.2 7.6
.01
(Y) 7.2 6.4 5.0
(0)
4.6 3.8 3.4
81
TABLE 4
THREE-WAY ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE OP EXPERIMENT III
Source SS df MS F
P
Within Cells 379.350
95 3.993
A 114.990 1 114.990 28.7
.001*
L
73.797
2
36.899
9.2 .001*
P
2056.773 3 685.591 171.7
.001*
AL 14.678 2
7.339
1.8
.165
AP 26.596
3 8.865
2.2
.091
LP
48.831 6
8.139
2.0 .068
ALP 31.892 6
5.315 1.3 .251
*A11 values significant at the .001 level.
82
Under a prompter probability level of .01, both
age groups approached significance on all the learning
conditions but none reached the .05 level. There were no
significant interactions found on any of the conditions.
CHAPTER IX
DISCUSSION
The resultB of* the experiments clearly Bhow that
cued recall and recognition were superior in both the old
and the young age groups, with the recognition score for
both groups showing near perfect performance. Thus, under
the conditions of the present experiment, cued recall and
recognition were superior to free recall. Some of the
relevant features, however, of the types of tests that
were administered to the subjects must be identified for
the purpose of the interpretation of the results.
The present investigation was intended as an
attempt to generalize the findings of Schonfield (1965) anc3
to modify his procedures in order to teBt the effect
"cuing" has on recall. An attempt was made to construct
a recognition test that would reflect "true" recognition
rather than eliminate the incorrect alternatives, a criti
cism that Schonfield (1965) as well as other investigators
has been subjected to (Bahrick & Bahrick, 1964; McNulty &
Caird, 1966, 1967)•
In accord with one of the hypotheses of this
study and consistent with previous findings (Postman, 1952;
83
84
Postman & Rau, 1957; Bruce & Cofer, 1965)> recognition was
superior to recall for both age groups. Further., as pre
dicted and in keeping with Schonfield's (1965) findings,
the results indicate increasing superiority of recognition
over recall with increasing age. In agreement with Schon
field (1965)^ it can be seen that there is no deterioration
with age in recognition but a marked decrement in recall.
A criticism that has been made here is that given by
McNulty and Calrd (1967). They stated that the recogni
tion test used by Schonfield (1965) was too easy for the
particular subject population he used. They hypothesized
that given a reasonably demanding recognition test, that
the scores on the recognition test would deteriorate with
age. Caird (1965) compared 20 elderly memory-disordered
subjects with 20 subjects matched for age, digit-Bpan
forward, and WAIS Verbal Scale IQ on both the recall and
recognition of word lists. His results indicated that the
memory-disordered group recalled and recognized signifi
cantly fewer words than did the control group.
McNulty and Caird (1967a, 1967b) argued that
Schonfield's (1965) conclusion that recognition scores may
not be affected by age cannot be taken as evidence that
there were no differences In the amount learned. McNulty
and Caird (1967a), In other words, suggested that recogni
tion scores may be "Inflated" by partial learning. This
line of reasoning would imply that even though the older
85
subjects in Schonfield's (1965) study probably did not
learn the list as completely as the younger subjects, par
tial learning would enable them to recognize the words or
to eliminate false alternatives, thus giving an exaggerated
indication of their true level of retention, whereas in
recall the deficit would be quite apparent (Crenshaw,
1969) •
Hartley and Marshall (1967) failed to find evi
dence for McNulty and Caird's (1967a* 1967b) hypothesis
that recognition scores were inflated by partial learning.
They presented two lists of words and subjects were re
quired to recognize previously presented verbal materials
embedded in both different and similar materials. No dif
ferences in performance were observed on the different
recognition tests. It should be noted that Hartley and
Marshall (1967) used a very small n (four subjects per
group) and that subjects were able to remember 99 percent
of the word pairs presented with lists up to 500 items and
95 percent of a 700-pair list, although each pair was only
presented once.
Schonfield (1965) made the assumption that only
recall, not recognition, requires retrieval from storage.
Whether this can be ascertained is not certain, but it has
been assumed by others that retrieval playB an integral
role in recognition as well as recall (Tulving, 1968).
86
According to this view, both operations require a search
and retrieval process. In recall the search is unaided
and depends on such factors as being able to discriminate
the correct items from others which come to mind (Slamecka,
1967). In recognition, the search and retrieval process is
aided by a cue and culminates when the search turns up a
stored item which matches the criterion stimulus. As
Tulving'B (1968) experimental results indicate, the recog
nition process, like recall, Is dependent on cues present
for retrieval. He found that recall can be even higher
than recognition "whenever retrieval cueB present at the
recall test are more effective In providing access to the
stored Information than are retrieval cues present at the
recognition test [p. 5^ ] •"
It would appear from these findings that If
retrieval processes are Indeed faulty in the memory systems
of the elderly as suggested by Schonfield (19^5)^ this
should show up In recognition performance as well as re
call, especially where the cues for retrieval In recogni
tion are minimal. As Davis, Sutherland, and Judd (1961)
have pointed out, a recognition sheet not only assures
item availability; it also automatically restricts the
number of alternatives from which choices are to be made
(Crenshaw, 19&9)•
Why do older people experience more difficulty In
retrieval processes than young persons? Welford (1958) has
hypothesized that the memory systems of elderly people are
increasingly liable to interference with advancing age.
Peixotto (1947) tested the interference hypothesis that
with advancing age, subjects are more susceptible to the
effects of retroactive inhibition. Her results supported
the hypothesis that older subjects are more liable to
interference, and this accounts for the retrieval difficul
ties experienced by the elderly subjects on retention
tasks.
If older people have difficulty in memory re
trieval, as indicated by the present findings, and if
interference in the form of retroactive inhibition under
lies the retrieval problem in recognition, as suggested by
Peixotto (19^7)» what accounts for the age impairment of
retrieval in free recall? In free recall it has been sug
gested that the use of mediators plays an important role in
the learning and remembering process (Adams, 1967J
Canestrari, 1968). If the Bubject; can form mnemonic asso
ciations (mediators) between two or more words as trials
progress, these associations could be used to benefit
recall. Although there has been little systematic study
of mediators in free recall, several Investigators (Bous-
field, Puff, & Cowan, 1964; Tulving, 1962) have reported
the Increased tendency with trials to repeat combinations
of words, which Is likely to be a product of the use of
mediators (Crenshaw, 1969).
88
Canestrari (1968), providing ready-made mediators
in a paired associates task, found that the provision of
mediators helped older subjects to develop the association
necessary for storing the pair in a manner that made it
more available for recall. Secondly, providing mediators
for the elderly subjects could have resulted in raising
their confidence levels thus improving their scores.
In keeping with the findings of Tulving (1968).,
it has been assumed in this study that there are search
and retrieval processes operating in recognition as well
as in recall. Although retrieval difficulties in recogni
tion did not appear in this Btudy, other studies (Peixotto,
19^7) using longer lists of words have provided evidence
that greater susceptibility to retroactive inhibition
effects may account for the age retrieval problem in
recognition.
McNulty (1965) demonstrated in his experiment
that the "superiority of recognition over recall is due in
part to the use of the whole item as the basic unit of
measurement [p. 430]." McNulty suggested that "partial"
learning takes the place of many items which makes them
easily recognized, but gives the subject to little infor
mation available to make recall successful. When the
opportunities for partial learning were restricted, much
of the difference between recall and recognition disap
peared.
89
Davis, Sutherland, and Judd (1961) suggested
that recognition scores are higher than recall because of
fewer alternatives to choose from in recognition. They
hypothesized, however, that the amount of information that
is actually transmitted is the same. By calculating the
amount of information transmitted by each subject,
it was found that at least as much information was
transmitted in recall as in recognition and that
the amount of information transmitted in the recog
nition conditions tended to increase as the number
of alternatives from which selection was made
[p. 429].
Brown (1965)* hy estimating the average proba
bility of rejecting the wrong poBBiblllty in a recall and
recognition test, showed that although recognition was
superior to recall, the traditional method exaggerates the
difference between them. Brown concluded that "these find
ings are held to be consistent with the hypothesis that
the inferiority of recall is due to a failure to scan the
possibilities effectively [p. 401]."
A number of studies have demonstrated that the
use of mediators or cueB can facilitate recall (Canestrari,
1968j Cramer, 1966). Whatever the underlying mechanism is
in recall, cuing has a facilitating effect on performance.
Tulving and Pearlstone (1966), using "category
cues," showed that "sufficiently intact memory traces of
many words not recalled under the noncued recall condi
tions were available in the memory storage, but not
accessible for retrieval [p. 381]." Their findings are
consistent with the present findings that recall is higher
under the cued recall condition than under non-cued recall.
It would appear that failure to recall an item does not
necessarily mean the trace is no longer available., but
that there is a failure to find that trace. Feigenbaum
(1961) noted that forgetting occurs because learned mate
rial becomes "inaccessible in a large and growing associa
tion network [p. 125]." It would appear that the inability
to recall words is attributable to the inaccessibility of
otherwise intact memory traceB (Tulving & Pearlstone,
1966) .
Cramer (1966), using priming words and cue-
stimulus words, found that "mediated priming increases the
probability of occurrence of the desired response [p.
165].”
Lawrence (1967) found similar results aB those
found in this paper. By increasing the number of cues in
a free recall experiment she found that if the subjects
received the cues juBt before recall, the old subjects did
almost as well as the young subjects.
The results suggest that cuing has an important
effect on recall by making the inaccessible traces more
accessible and that older people benefit more from cuing
91
because failure in recall Is due more to a retrieval prob
lem than to a storage problem in the elderly.
The results of the Incidental studies are also
interesting. It can be seen that the observed differences
between intentional and Incidental learning result from the
effect of the instruction stimuli which influence the
amount and characteristics of learning by determining the
differential cue-producing responses. Instructions to
learn produce appropriate representational responses during
presentation of the material, whereas under Incidental
learning conditions this is the caBe to a lesser degree
(McLaughlin, 1965).
Most studies in incidental learning have been
concerned with the differences found between incidental
and intentional learning and measuring the amount of mate
rial incidentally learned. As a rule these differences
found between incidental and intentional learning are a
function of the differences in the orienting task itself.
Saltzman (1956), for example, has shown that by manipulat
ing the orienting instructions different amounts of Inci
dental learning are demonstrated. Depending on the task
that Is required of the intentional subject, It has been
found that under certain conditions the orienting task
could actually interfere with Intentional learning to such
a degree that Incidental learning was superior to inten
tional learning (Neimark & Saltzman, 1953)•
92
Postman (1964) stated that the difference be
tween intentional and incidental learning reduces to zero
when learning is either seriously hindered or maximally
facilitated by the orienting task. McLaughlin (1965)* on
the other hand* agreed with the first part of this conten
tion but stated that the instruction stimuli administered
to subjects in the incidental group will facilitate learn
ing to a lesser degree, although incidental subjects may
even surpass Intentional subjects when the incidental sub
jects receive other information that interferes with learn
ing (McLaughlin, 1965)•
In intentional learning experiments, increasing
amounts of material have an adverse effect by causing more
intra-serial interference. In Incidental learning, how
ever, the effects of Intra-serial interference are not as
severe (Postman & Adams, 1957)• Because of this, Postman
and Adams (1958) hypothesized that Increases in the amount
of material should have a less adverse affect on incidental
than on Intentional learning. Their results indicated that
Increases In the amount of material did have less effect
on Incidental than on Intentional learning as well as an
interaction effect between length of the list and meaning
fulness of the material.
Postman and Adams (1956), In order to explain
the findings obtained In incidental learning, also studied
the effects of retroactive inhibition. Since original
learning is usually higher under intentional learning and
since the degree of original learning and amount of retro
active inhibition are inversely related, one would expect
to find less interference under intentional than under
incidental learning. But because the distribution of
habit strengths differs under the two conditions, the
items learned by incidental subjects are likely to have
higher associative strengths. On the other hand, the
items learned under intentional learning are more numerous
but include more items of low strength. Consequently,
among those items learned by intentional subjects a
greater proportion are susceptible to interference. Be
cause the two effects tend to cancel each other out, "no
major differences are found in the relative amounts of
retroactive inhibition following intentional and inci
dental learning [McLaughlin, 19&5j P- 268]."
The results of the present incidental learning
experiments support the findings of other studies that the
superiority of intentional over incidental learning is not
inevitable, but is a function of definable conditions.
They further show that under conditions of cued recall and
under cuing where high probability prompters are being
used, the differences between the two age groups are
almost negligible.
94
Estes and DaPalito (1967)* using a recall and
recognition test, presented paired associates under either
an intentional or an incidental learning condition. Their
concern was whether or not verbal learning tapped different
processes of information storage and retrieval. They
rejected the classical association concept that recognition
and recall tests simply differ in sensitivity and suggested
an alternative hypothesis, referred to as a dual process
theory, which assumes
the state of an item of information in memory
storage and the behavior of retrieving it on a
recall test to be conceptually quite distinct,
with the latter being modifiable independently
of the former [p. 18].
They made the assumption that the probability of recall or
retrieval responses should be strongly modified by re
hearsal, but under a recognition task these differences
would not be found. Their results indicated that very
little difference was found in amount learned following
incidental as compared to intentional learning. Under the
free recall conditions large decrements in performance
were found following incidental learning, suggesting "that
recall performance involves a retrieval process which can
be modified independently of the information storage
required for recognition performance [p. 18]." Others,
however, have different interpretations of these results.
Eagle and Leiter (1964) suggested that the different
learning conditions modify not the amount learned, but
rather the subjectsT tendency to adopt effective recall
strategies. Postman, Adams, and Phillips (1955), on the
other hand, assumed that rehearsal plays a greater role
under the intentional learning condition and that the sub
ject acquires relatively more multiple associations of
intermediate strength than under the incidental learning
condition. ThuB, under either learning condition, subjects
possess the adequate associative strength for the more
sensitive recognition procedure, but under a recall test
they are penalized because of fewer associations of inter
mediate strength. Again, however, under a high prompter
probability level no difference was found for either group
under intentional or incidental learning.
Another variable that receives considerable
attention is the depth at which the items are being proc
essed. Hyde and Jenkins (1969) found that when words are
encoded as semantic units, incidental recall and organiza
tion are facilitated. Evidently, words learned under an
incidental condition can be recalled as efficiently as
those learned under an incidental task if they are seman
tically coded during storage. The results of the present
experiments show that words that are not semantically coded
but are processed at a lower level are more difficult to
recall for both the young and old age groups. It should
be noted, however, that even under these conditions the
words that have been stored can be retrieved by using a
cuing procedure. Similar results were found by Bobrow and
Bower (1969) using cues under an incidental learning condi
tion. Rosenberg and Schiller (1971) also found a facili
tating effect in the recall of information learned under
Incidental-semantic and intentional learning conditions,
but inferior performance was found In the incidental-
non-semantic group. The fact that intentional learners
did not surpass the incidental-semantic subjects suggests
that the main contribution to learning efficiency of the
intent to memorize the information was the semantic coding
during input.
How the information is coded and classified will
affect recall to a large degree. Rabbitt (1968) has
pointed out that "there is evidence that old subjects fail
to extract from available data rules of classification
that may simplify a task [p. 83]." This failure to
abstract these rules, however, may be one of the reasons
why older persons perform as well as they do on certain
incidental tasks. In other words, they are unable to
select between critical and incidental aspects of complex
situations, therefore obtaining inflated scores on an
incidental learning task. The younger subjects, on the
other hand, are processing what they consider to be more
pertinent information on the incidental task, but when
97
they are asked to recall other attributes of the learning
situation they are at a disadvantage.
As was noted previously, both groups did progres
sively poorer as the prompter probability decreased. This
decrement might be caused by shiftB of attention between
perceptual and memory functions. There are two possible
causes in the attention-short-term memory complex that
could account for the present results. First it might be
that the short-term memory trace decays unless attention
is turned to storage rather than to perception or response,
and any distracting factors such as additional tasks (inci
dental tasks) could reduce the attention paid to storage
and accelerate decay. A second explanation could be that
there is a narrowing of attention which results in less
information being processed in a given period of time or
at least not being processed as efficiently. In the pres
ent experiments time should not have been an important
factor, since 5 seconds per word plus an inter-trial
interval of 4 seconds was used. However, an incidental
and an orienting task were used which had an adverse
effect on both age groups but became more apparent in the
old group.
It has been suggested by Birren (personal com
munication) that it may be that the older person is over
aroused and this interferes with the retrieval process, but
not the storage of information itself. The results of
98
Wimer and Wigdor (1958) seem to eliminate thiB possibility,
however, since their young and old subjects did not differ
on retention scores when they learned a paired associate
list for the same criterion.
In summary, it can be seen that there are sig
nificant differences between recall and recognition under
both incidental and intentional learning, indicating a
possible retrieval deficit in the old. In order to give
more credence to this point of view, a cued recall test
was used. The results of cuing gave more evidence that
retrieval and not storage is where the main problem lies
In memory loss In the old. It can also be seen that as
the prompter probabilities decrease, a differential loss
Is found with age because of Increasing interference and
the loss of attention.
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99
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Changes In Memory As A Function Of Age
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