Retroactive interference in short-term recognition memory for pitch.

Abstract

Investigated the effects of different retroactive stimuli on pitch discrimination in a short-term recognition memory task. 4 female undergraduates served as Ss in Exp. I, and 50 in Exp. II. Tones, Gaussian noise, and “blank” stimuli were employed in the retroactive (interference) interval. The effects of different stimuli in the interference (I) interval are highly dependent on the strategies of S. Tones or noise in the I interval produce more forgetting than blank I intervals. Decrease in accuracy of perceptual memory over time with filled I intervals was attributed to interference rather than decay. A storage-forgetting model of perceptual memory described the quantitative results accurately. (16 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)