Explanations For Forgetting: Retrieval Failure Flashcards
What is meant by retrieval failure as an explanation for forgetting?
Retrieval failure occurs when the specific cues present at the time of encoding information are not present at the time of recalling this information.
What is context dependent forgetting?
When an individual forgets something due to the absence of external cues. The external cues at the time of encoding the information do not match those at the time of recalling the information.
What is state dependent forgetting?
When an individual forgets due to the absence of internal cues. The internal cues at the time of encoding do not match those present at the time of recall.
Outline Godden and Baddley’s study on context-dependent forgetting.
They used word lists to investigate if context had an impact on forgetting.
4 conditions: encode on land - recall on land, encode in water - recall in water, encode on land - recall in water and encode in water - recall on land.
The researchers found that in matching conditions, recall was significantly higher - accurate recall was 40 percent lower in non-matching conditions.
Outline Carter and Cassaday’s study on state dependent forgetting.
They used word lists to investigate whether internal cues led to retrieval failure.
Drugs were given to pps which made them slightly drowsy, there were 4 conditions: encode on drug - recall on drug, encode not on drug - recall not on drug, encode on drug- recall not on drug and learn not on drug - recall on drug.
The researchers found that in mismatched conditions, recall was poor.
Give two limitations of retrieval failure.
- Context effects may depend on the type of memory being tested.
Godden and Baddley repeated their original experiment but instead of testing recall tested recognition. They used the exact same 4 conditions however, instead of recalling the words from the word list, pps had to say whether or not they recognised a word.
The researchers found that there was no context dependent effect, results the same across all 4 conditions.
Therefore, retrieval failure is a limited explanation to forgetting.
- Studies on retrieval failure lack ecological validiity as they are not reflective of real life.
Baddley stated that in real life, it is difficult to find contexts and settings which are as different as land and water. In real life, most people will learn something in one room and recall it in another. There is unlikely to be a large amount of forgetting as both contexts are not that different.
Therefore, retrieval failure due to lack of context cues does not explain why people forget in real life and so is a limited theory
Give one strength of retrieval failure.
- Retrieval failure can explain interference effects.
Tulving and Psotka gave pps word lists which consisted of many different categories. After learning the words, pps were asked to recall - the more lists a pp learnt, the worse their performance became. However, when pps were given cued recall where they were told the names of categories, recall averaged at about 70 percent regardless of how many lists they learnt.
Therefore, this shows that retrieval failure is a more important explanation than interference.
