A03 - Proactive Interference

There is research support for proactive interference by who?

Wickens

Wickens gave participants 4 trials using the same procedure as…

Peterson and Peterson's duration experiment (nonsense trigrams)

What were the same stimuli in trials 1-3 and trial 4?

Letter based then number based

Through trials 1-3, what was found compared to trial 4?

Performance gradually declined compared to number based trial which remained at almost 100% recall

What did Wickens believe about the 4th trial?

Because the material was different, it was easier to recall and remember

How does the decline in performance on trials 1-3 show evidence for proactive interference?

The old information interfered with the new information due to their similarity

However, who provides evidence to suggest that some people are less affected by proactive interference than others?

Vogel et al

Participants were given a series of tasks to test their working memory capacity. What were the highest and lowest scores given?

Additional tasks to create proactive interference

It was found that individuals with high working memory capacity…

We’re much less likely to be affected for proactive interference than low working memory capacity individuals

What did researchers suggest a high WMC was associated with?

An enhanced filtering ability which helps prevent irrelevant information from cluttering working memory

This makes high WMC less susceptible to proactive interference as they are…

More effective at maintaining focus on relevant information

What does this evidence suggest about interference theory as an explanation for forgetting?

To have a complete explanation for forgetting and how memory works, the theory also needs to consider individual differences