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CHAPtER 7 MeMory
193
disrupting the waves rippling out from
Percentage of 100% the first.
original vocabulary New learning in the hour before we
retained 90 fall asleep suffers less retroactive inter-
80 Retention ference, because the chances of dis-
drops,
70 ruption are few (Mercer, 2015). In a classic
experiment, two people each learned
60 then levels off
some nonsense syllables (Jenkins &
50
Dallenbach, 1924). When they tried to recall
40 them after a night’s sleep, they could
30 retrieve more than half the items. But
diego_cervo/iStock/Getty Images 10 0 1 3 5 9 /2 14 /2 25 35 /2 49 /2 then stayed awake and were involved
when they learned the material and
20
with other activities, they forgot more,
and sooner (FIGURE 7.17).
1
1
1
1
The hour before sleep is a good time
Time in years after completion of Spanish course
FIGURE 7.15 The forgetting curve for Spanish learned in school to commit information to memory
(Scullin & McDaniel, 2010), but not the seconds
just before sleep (Wyatt & Bootzin, 1994).
And if you’re considering learning while
But there is a third possibility. The Retrieval problems occasionally stem
book — or memory — may be out of reach from interference and even from moti- sleeping, forget it. We have little memory
for information played aloud in the room
because we don’t have enough infor- vated forgetting. during sleep, although our ears do regis-
mation to access it. For example, what ter it (Wood et al., 1992).
causes frustrating “tip- of- the- tongue” Interference Old and new information do not
forgetting? (People who are deaf and As you collect more and more informa- always compete. Previously learned
fluent in sign language may experience tion, your mental attic never fills, but it information (Latin) often facilitates our
a parallel “tip- of- the- fingers” feeling gets cluttered. Your brain tries to keep learning of new information (French).
[Thompson et al., 2005].) These are retrieval things tidy. Using a new password weak- This effect is called positive transfer.
problems (FIGURE 7.16). Given retrieval ens your memory of competing old pass-
cues (It begins with an M), you may easily words (Wimber et al., 2015). But sometimes
retrieve the memory. Older adults more the clutter wins, as new and old learn- Motivated Forgetting
frequently have these frustrating tip- ing collide. Proactive (forward- acting) To remember our past is often to revise
of- the- tongue experiences (Abrams, 2008; interference occurs when an older mem- it. Years ago, the huge cookie jar in
Salthouse & Mandell, 2013). ory makes it more difficult to remember my [DM’s] kitchen was jammed with
Here’s a question to test your memory. new information. If you buy a new com- freshly baked cookies. Still more were
Do you recall the second sentence we bination lock, your well- rehearsed old cooling across racks on the counter. A
asked you to remember — about the combination may interfere with your day later, not a crumb was left. Who
swimmer? If not, does the word shark retrieval of the new one. had taken them? During that time, my
serve as a retrieval cue? Experiments R e t r o ac t i v e (backward- acting) wife, three children, and I were the only
show that shark (the image you prob- interference occurs when new learning people in the house. So while memo-
ably visualized) more readily retrieves disrupts your memory of older infor- ries were still fresh, I conducted a little
the image you stored than does the sen- mation. If someone sings new words to memory test. Andy admitted wolfing
tence’s actual word, fish (Anderson et al., an old song’s tune, you may have trou- down as many as 20. Peter thought he
1976). (The sentence was, The fish attacked ble remembering the original. Imagine
the swimmer.) a second stone being tossed in a pond,
anterograde amnesia an inability to
form new memories.
retrograde amnesia an inability to
Encoding remember information from our past.
External Sensory Attention Working/ Long-term memory trace lasting physical change in
memory
event memory short-term
memory storage the brain as a memory forms.
Retrieval
proactive interference the forward- acting
disruptive effect of older learning on the
Retrieval failure
leads to forgetting recall of new information.
retroactive interference the backward-
FIGURE 7.16 Retrieval failure Sometimes even stored information cannot be accessed, which leads acting disruptive effect of newer learning
to forgetting. on the recall of old information.

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