Interference theory

Interference

When information in LTM gets confused or combined with other information during encoding this distorting memories

Proactive interference

Old memories disrupt new memories

Retroactive interference

New memories disrupt old memories

Mcgeogh and Mcdonald

• Aim: to investigate whether recall depended on type of interfering material

• Method: Pps had to memorise list of words; 1:Synonyms 2:antonyms 3:unrelated words 4:nonsense syllables 5: list of numbers 6:control

• Findings: Lowest recall was synonym group and highest was numbers and control group

Baddeley and Hitch

• To investigate the effects of interference in real life

• Findings: Rugby players who played more games were less likely to recall names from early in the season

• Keppel and Underwood: To investigate the effects of interference on LTM

Keppel and underwood

• To investigate the effects of interference on LTM

• Pps presented trigrams at 3 second intervals

• Pps typically remembered trigrams first presented

Opposing research

P: effects can be temporary

E: Tilving and Psotka found that pps recall became worse as they learned a new list but after a cued recall and being told names of categories recall rose again to 70%

E: Information was stored but couldn’t be accessed only when cues were provided

L: Causes temporary retrieval failure rather than permanent damage

Science

P: Supporting evidence is highly scientific

E: Mcgeogh and Mcdonald’s lists establishes cause and effect between list type and recall

E: No extraneous variables

L: Scientific

Validity

P: Lab experiments

E: Mcgeogh and Mcdonald

E: Lack ecological validity and mundane realism

L: Findings cannot be generalised to real life situations