Sparrow (2011): Negative Effects on Cognition

Background

Sparrow et al, 2011 wondered if the Internet has become an enormous transactive memory store.

If this is true, then individuals no longer feel the need to remember information but simply need to remember how to search for it effectively using a search engine such as Google.

It is difficult to determine whether this is a positive or negative effect of technology. Remember, this effect only works for declarative memory, but not other types of memory.

Digital Amnesia

The experience of forgetting information that you trust a digital device to store and remember for you.

Google Effect

The Google effect, also called digital amnesia, is the tendency to forget information that can be found readily online by using Internet search engines.

Aim

To investigate if we invest less effort in committing info to memory (a cognitive process) if we believe we can simply retrieve the info from an external memory store e.g google at a later date

Method:

Lab experiment.

2 x 2 Independent measure design (two independent variables were manipulated at two different levels).

Participants

Sixty undergraduate Harvard University students

37 female

23 male

Procedure

Participants were asked to type 40 trivia facts into the computer.

Some of the facts were expected to represent new knowledge while other facts were more likely to be already known to the participants.

Example: An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

Whilst other facts were more likely to be already known to the participants.

The space shuttle Columbia disintegrated during re-entry over Texas in Feb. 2003.

Participants were presented with trivia statements one by one on a computer screen.

They were asked to read the statements, and then type what they read into a dialog box which appeared below the statement.

Half of the participants were told to press the spacebar to save what they typed to the computer, and that they would have access to what they typed at the end of the task.

The other half were told to press the spacebar in order to erase what they just typed so that they could type the next statement.

In addition, half were told to try to remember the statements, and half were told nothing.

This means that four conditions were present in the study:

- Save and remember

- Save not asked to remember

- Erase remember

- Erase not asked to remember

They were then given a blank piece of paper and asked to recall as many of the facts as they could in ten minutes.

Then they were given a recognition task where they were given forty statements and asked to identify (yes or no) whether they were exactly the same as what they saw on the computer screen.

IV

1) told info would be stored/not stored

2)told to remember/not told to remember

DV

Memory

Results

The results showed that being asked to remember the information made no significant difference to the participants' ability to recall the trivia facts, but there was a significant difference if the participant believed that the information would be stored in the computer.

Participants who believed they would be able to retrieve the information from the computer appear to have made far less effort to remember the information than those who knew they would not be able to do this.

Computer will save info:

- Asked to remember: 19

- Not asked to remember: 22

Computer will erase info:

- Asked to remember: 29

- Not asked to remember: 31

Conclusion

Participants who believed they would be able to retrieve the info from the computer appear to have made as less to remember the info than those who knew they wouldn't be able to do this.

However, it's not really possible to measure the "level of effort" in this study, so although we can see that there's an effect on recall, we cannot be certain as to why this difference exists.

Critical thinking: methodological considerations

The sample was made up of university students who are used to memorizing and using a computer. This may not reflect the more general population.

It is highly possible that there were demand characteristics and that the aim of the research was figured out by participants.

The tasks had low ecological validity. In addition to knowing that they were part of an experiment, the information that they were being exposed to was of limited value or interest to the students. Research shows that we tend to remember information that we process deeply and that is of personal relevance. Neither of these two variables was measured in these studies.

Attempts to replicate Sparrow's findings have not been successful. The failure of replications studies challenges the reliability of these findings.

Critical thinking: alternative explanations

Some of the facts may be more personally relevant to the participants than others. This would make them more likely to be recalled.

One's ability to type may also have had an effect on their recall; if they were frustrated with the typing process, especially since they were being watched, this may lead to anxiety which would have influenced their ability to recall.

Participant variability: the verbal declarative memory skills of the participants may not have been the same with small sample size, this may lead to a distortion of the results.

Some participants may be more dependent on their computers than others.

There may be philosophical differences amount the participants. Having a belief that there's no need to memories why is available online may have led to a pattern of behaviour, which means that memorisation skills aren't developed.

Critical thinking: gender bias

Greater female representation.

Hence could skew data.

Critical thinking: ethical considerations

All ethics were held up.

Critical thinking: cultural considerations

Conducted in America, hence potential of WEIRD characteristics.

Critical thinking: applications

Use of computer to take notes.