retrieval failure + eval Flashcards
what is retrieval failure?
a form of forgetting
when does retrieval failure occur?
when we dont have the necessary cues to access memory. If the cues aren’t available at the time of recall then we wont be able to ACCESS the memories even though they are available.
what is a cue?
a trigger of information that allows us to access a memory. Can be meaningful or meaningless.
What did Tulving’s Encoding Specificity Principle state about a cue?
in order for it to be helpful it must be:
-present at coding
-present at retrieval
why must the cues be present at both coding and retrieval for them to be useful?
if the cues aren’t present at retrieval, or are different, there will be forgetting
what is context-dependant forgetting?
recall that depends on environmental factors such as weather or a place
what is state-dependant forgetting?
recall that depends on an internal cue (Feeling upset or drunk.)
Key study for retrieval failure?
Godden and Baddeley
outline the study and findings of Godden and Baddeley
studied deep sea divers.
-learnt a list of words under water or on land
-asked to recall either underwater or on land
FINDINGS:
-accurate recall was 40% lower in the non-matching conditions.
THEREFORE
the external cues at learning were diff from the ones available at recall leading to RF.
one strength of RF as an explanation of forgetting is that it has research support from Godden and BAddeley
-explain findings
This study has high internal validity because it was a CONTROLLED experiment and so controlled extran variables, reducing them from becoming confounding.
therefore this supports RF as an explanation of forgetting as it has HIGH internal validity.
one problem with baddeleys study is that it is artificial, this means that..
It lacks ECOLOGICAL validity and the findings cannot relate well to REAL life situations.
Therfore, this study DOES support r.f. only in more EXTREME situations, but does not necessarily support r.f. in real life situations.
retrieval failure as an explanation of forgetting is useful as it provides us with practical application..
Being prompted by context cues helps in retrieving memory, therefore this technique has been developed by police in the COGNITIVE INTERVIEW.
therefore, r.f. is a valuable explanation because it has practical application in real life, both in official context (police) or everyday such as advising people how to recall important info (exams)
