Proactive interference and the functional ablation hypothesis: More disconfirmatory data

Abstract

Abstract According to the functional ablation hypothesis, memories for which amnesia has been hypnotically suggested do not interact with other information in memory. This hypothesis was tested in 2 interrelated experiments. In Experiment 1,Ss high and low in hypnotic susceptibility were administered a hypnotic induction procedure and tested on a Brown-Peterson (e.g., Wickens & Gittis, 1974) memory task designed to induce proactive interference (PI).Ss were exposed to 10 blocks of successive 3-word lists. Within each block, all words were strongly related, and, therefore, lists presented early in a block interfered with the retention of lists presented later (PI “buildup”). Following the “buildup” of PI,Ss were administered either a cue to be amnesic for the previous words of a block or a cue to relax. Contrary to the functional ablation hypothesis, the amnesia suggestion did not produce a “release” from PI in high susceptible hypnoticSs. In other words, the amnesia suggestion did not prevent previously learned material from interfering with newly presented material. Experiment 2 demonstrated that the amnesia cues employed in the Brown-Peterson task produced a reversible recall deficit even though they failed to produce PI “release.” These findings are consistent with the results of studies of the functional ablation hypothesis using the retroactive interference paradigms.