1a. As seen in Table 3, the scores of all the participants have a similar trend in the first three
trials and a different trend in the fourth trial. In the low semantic condition, more words (5/6)
were recalled by the participant. In the moderate semantic condition, the same trend followed. In
the high semantic condition, the participant scored only 2/6 which is a different trend than the
first two conditions. This can also be observed in Figure 1 and 2.
Release from Proactive inhibition refers to the process of restoration of the ability to recall items
due to a change in the category of stimuli. In the first condition, the first participant’s recall
increased after the three pre-test trials of the same category, i.e, fruits. The test trial consisted of
professions, which was a huge category shift, so the participant was able to recall much better. In
the second condition, there was some semantic similarity, but the category was flowers in the test
trial, so again the participant recalled more in the test trial. In the third condition, the category in
the fourth trial was similar so the participant couldn't recall the fruits properly. So, in the first two
conditions there was release from Proactive Inhibition whereas in the third one there wasn’t. The
build-up of proactive inhibition was there in the first three trials for all three participants as the
names of the fruits were either getting forgotten or mixed up due to the similarity of the primary
cue. Release from Proactive Inhibition only happened in the first two conditions despite the
build up in all the three conditions, due to the reasons mentioned above.
2a. In the first participant's case, the score went down from 6/6, i.e, 100% to 4/6, i.e, 67%, to
3/6, i.e, 50% in the first three trials. But, in the last trial, which was the test trial for the low
semantic condition, the score increased to 5/6, i.e, 83.33%. A similar trend was observed for the
second participant as well, where the score decreased from 6/6, i.e, 100% to 5 /6, i.e, 83.33%, to
3/6, i.e, 50% in the first three trials, with the last trial being at 5/6,i.e,83.33% as well. In the third
participant’s case, again, a similar trend was observed where the scores decreased from 5/6,i.e,
83.33% to 5 /6 again, i.e,83.33%, to 2/6, i.e, 33.33%. In the third participant’s case, there was a
difference of scores as compared to the first two participants. The third participant scored 2/6, i.e,
33.33% in the test trial of high semantic condition. There has been a study decline of recall for
all the participants at some point. For the first two participants, the scores declined 2nd trial
onwards and continued the same for the third trial. For the third participant, the scores declined
3rd trial onwards, and the participant scored the same in the first two trials. This shows that there
was a build up of proactive inhibition due to the fact that similar kinds of words were being used
on cards to show the participants. All the words were of a similar primary cue, which were the
fruits. The recall decreased due to their inability to recall the words as more and more trials
passed. The names of fruits were either forgotten or being mixed up with the ones from the
previous trials.
2b. Yes, the mean scores of all three participants for the first three trials, that is, the pre-test
trials, are roughly equated. This is because all the three participants had a steady decline in recall
of words, and it was similar if not the same. The mean scores for the first, second and third
participants were 4.33,4.66 and 4 respectively. So, it can be concluded that they’re roughly
equated if not exactly the same.
2c. The first participant got confused between “lemon” and “melon” in the second and third
trials. The word melon from the second trial was repeated onto the third trial in place of lemon.
When asked about it, the participant simply talked about being confused as there were too many
fruits to remember at once and that both these words were very similar sounding because of
which the confusion occurred. The third participant could only recall two words in the third trial,
which was very less compared to the previous scores of the third participant as well as all the
scores of the first two participants. When asked about it, the participant just stated that
remembering the names of all the fruit at later stages just wasn’t possible because there were too
many to remember and that there was also confusion from the names of fruits shown before in
the first and second trial. These are classic examples of proactive inhibition and cue overload,
which can be explained using theory given by Watkins and Watkinds in 1975. The Retrieval view
of Release from Proactive Inhibition states that the successive items will be encoded in a similar
way, but due to the increase in items there will be difficulty in the recall. The third participant
also seemed very tired and disinterested towards the end of the experiment which could also
mean that the participant didn’t make enough effort to recall.
2d. In the counting backward by 3s task, the first participant counted backward in a moderate
speed and mostly counted correctly without the experimenter having to correct the participant
constantly. The participant seemed very comfortable with the task as well, especially after the
practice. The second participant’s speed of counting backwards was also moderate enough but
there were a few errors that had to be constantly corrected despite practicing a few times. The
experimenter observed that the participant was overly conscious about the counting backwards
task and was trying to count the right words. The participant mentioned in the post task questions
about feeling embarrassed when they got the numbers wrong, because they thought of this as an
intelligence test. This was probed into more, and the participant mentioned that for them, the
main experiment was the counting backwards and it was a sign of how intelligent a person is
depending on their mathematical abilities.
In the case of the third participant, the counting backwards was very slow and inaccurate. The
participant started feeling demotivated after the experimenter corrected them constantly. The
participant was also a little impatient in terms of counting backwards, and were constantly
shaking their legs while trying to think of what words to remember.
2e. Yes, the participants’ performance corresponded with the post task questions. All of them
mentioned getting confused about words from previous lists, which corresponded in the
responses as well. Their responses for recall declined after each trial. The first participant
mentioned being able to recall more professions because they could imagine people in their
personal life with the same professions. This is called a self reference effect. The second
participant also focused on the counting backwards task more because of their notion of it being
an intelligence test. This made the participant more conscious during this task, which the
experimenter noticed as well. The participant thought that the recall task was nothing but a
distraction.
2f. Most of the controls were in place. The participants were all undergraduate students. The
exposure time of the cards was 6 seconds. The counting backward time was 18 seconds, and the
recall time for words given was 40 seconds. The numbers were also shown as soon as exposure
of words was done. For counting backwards by 3s, four different 3-digit numbers were used, one
per trial. Two of these numbers were even numbers and the remaining two were odd numbers.
Each experimenter used the same set of four 3-digit numbers for all three participants. A couple
of confounding variables were present, such as loud noise coming through the window because
of the construction. All participants mentioned that this was distracting. One more confounding
variable was that the second participant thought about how the counting backwards task was the
main task, as it was an indicator of intelligence. This made her lose focus from the actual task,
which they thought of as the distracting task.
3. The results support the hypothesis and aim of the experiment. The performance of participants
on all three trials declined steadily and in the fourth trial, according to the level of semantic
similarity, the responses were made. In low and moderate semantic similarity, a higher number of
words were recalled (Professions and flowers), whereas in the high semantic similarity condition
lesser words were recalled. The study by Watkins and Watkins in 1975 tried to support their view
of Retrieval view. The Retrieval view states that the successive items will be encoded in a
similar way, but due to the increase in items there will be difficulty in the recall. In an
experiment they conducted, the number of lists was increased which led to in final recall; and
supported the view that proactive interference is due to difficulty in a recall, and change in
category changes the cue and improves the recall leading to release of proactive inhibition.This
can be seen in the first two conditions of the experiment as participants were able to recall the
professions and flowers much better than the second and third trials of the pretest trials where the
recall was falling. For the third participant, since the cues were similar in the test trial as well,
there was no release of proactive inhibition.
According to Baddeley and Hitch’s theory, working memory relies on phonetic coding. This can
be noticed by the misinterpretation of “melon” and”lemon” as both are acoustically similar.
Verbal reasoning also shows effects of phonetic similarity. This pattern of results is just what
would be expected if the task depended on the use of a short-term store having the characteristics
typically shown in the memory span pattern. However, the magnitude of the effects suggest that
the system responsible for the memory span is only part of working memory. Short-term or
active memory is limited i.e. it can store a small amount of information and keep it readily
available for a brief time period. It can typically hold around 7 items (plus or minus 2) as
suggested by psychologist George Miller. Recent research has suggested that people have the
ability to store four chunks or pieces of information in STM. . Most information in short-term
memory can be retained for about 20 to 30 seconds. Forgetting refers to the failure to recall
material that has been learned previously i.e. it is the loss or change of information that was
previously stored in memory. The words were getting lost because of the counting backwards
task, as those numbers were being stored in the short term memory. After 20-30 seconds once
recall was taking place, the participants couldn't remember all the words because of this reason.
The words were being forgotten because the distractor task was interfering with the actual task.