F60P02: INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY II

TITLE: PSYCHOLOGICAL THEORIES OF FORGETTING

Forgetting happens when an error occurs in retrieving information that had been learnt. Although forgetting is a nature of memory, it has undoubtedly arises many problems to human. Some information has to be relearnt after forgetting whereas some memories may have been manipulated, such as sharpening, flattening and shortening (Barlett, 1932). The case is even worse in eye-witnesses testimony. The study of forgetting began from a German psychologist, Herman Ebbinghaus by testing himself. He created nonsense syllabus and learned them under minimal distraction. After that, he calculated his memory savings over time. He described memory retention declines rapidly soon after learning until a certain time, then levels off. This is referred to the forgetting curve. Although a single-participant experiment could hardly represent the whole population, however, much of the later experiments have proved that most people tend to follow the pattern of forgetting curve. Whereas some memories can last through a lifetime, but why most of the memories can be easily forgotten? To understand this, this essay will be discussing about the theories of forgetting. First of all, trace decay theory was proposed to explain the nature of forgetting. Trace decay theory focuses on the forgetting in short term memory. Donald Hebb (1949) suggested that newly learned information will create a trace in the memory, the trace will fade off over time if the information is not rehearsed. This theory has a certain similarities to the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve. The factor that causes forgetting in trace decay memory is time. Peterson and Peterson (1959) had conducted an experiment to prove the presence of trace decay theory. In their experiment, participants were told to memorise three consonants. They were told to recall the consonants within 3s to 30s intervals. During the intervals, they were given tasks so that they could not rehearse the consonants. They found that the retention of memory decreases over time. They also concluded that the short term memory trace is around 18s. Later research also showed some trace decay in long term memory. This

experiment lacks of mundane realism as in real life the consonants are not worth of memorising at most of the time. Nevertheless, Hebb (1949) implied that memories are embedded within the connections between neurones. This is known as the Hebbs Rule which was supported by synaptic consolidation. Eric Kendels observation on slugs neurones had successfully proved the molecular changes in synapse during learning, further enhancing trace decay theory. It involves neural plasticity, which refers to the changeable structure of synapses. Synaptic consolidation can be easily disrupted during the process. If the consolidation fails, memories become unavailable. Different types of memories require different time for consolidation. Memory becomes stable when the connection between neurones in the brain is stabilised. This shows that old memories are often more stable than new memories. In short, trace decay theory explains how the time can affect human short term memories. Bahrick (1984) shows trace decay in long term memory by study the retention of Spanish language (as a second language) in Americans throughout a 50-year period after they graduated by using participants from different age group. He proved that the forgetting of Spanish language as a long term memory also follows the pattern of forgetting curve. The forgetting curve has a logarithmic drop from the three to six years, then levels off with a little decrease over time, followed by a final drop at 30 years. This experiment also shows same pattern of forgetting. In biological view, throughout the time, neurones can be degraded, connections can be altered and neurones can die. These scenario leads to the change in synaptic connections, resulting in weakening of memories (Bailey & Chen, 1989). However, this experiment could not shows that the forgetting is all due to trace decay. In trace decay theory, it does not explain different events within the time interval will cause forgetting. In real life, peoples activities are very different from each other. Therefore, this experiment has no controlled over the time interval. It can be criticised that the forgetting might due to other

factors other than trace decay theory. Nevertheless, Perterson and Peterson who formerly proved the trace decay theory also proved the effect of interference theory. Next, the discussion will move on to the interference theory. The idea of interference theory was first proposed by Georg Elias Muller, states that memories were interfere by other memories which result in failing of retrieval (Muller & Pilzeck, 1900). There are two types of interference that leads to forgetting: (1) proactive interference, which states that older memories can distort the newly formed memory; (2) retroactive interference, which states that new memories can distort the old memories. Interference occurs when stimuli are similar whereas interference has little effect if stimuli are different. In real life, similar routine is more difficult to be remembered than a different one. For example, a dinner in neighbours house three months ago can be clearer in memory than a dinner in owns house one month ago. Watkins (1979) called this as the cue-overload principle, which means a cue (dinner in owns house) is paired to many items (different experience of dinner in owns house). Therefore, different memories paired to the same cue lead to difficulties in retrieving the target memory. Interference theory had become a hot discussion among psychologist in the early 20th century. John McGeoch (1932) argued that trace decay theory is not a valid scientific explanation. He used the analogy of iron rusting over time. In fact, time is not the factor but oxygen is the factor. He argued that same scenario can be applied on memories. Bower (1978) studied interference theory experimentally. Participants were asked to learn Spanish vocabulary first followed by Italian vocabulary, then tested with either vocabulary. Results showed that participants get confused between two vocabularies, proving interference effect. In another controlled group, participants were asked to learn either Spanish or Italian vocabulary followed by mathematics, then tested with the learnt vocabulary. Results showed better performance in the vocabulary. The results were the same if the order of learning was

shifted, ensuring no order effect. This is the basic interference experiment with high realism as the learning involved language. Beside the experiment carried out by Bower, many other experiments even going against trace decay theory. One of the experiment is conducted by Underwood (1957).He found that participants performances reduce when they participated in more trials. Interference could be exist unconsciously because all the consonants are relatively similar, thus confusing the participants. Underwood (1962) argued that Peterson and Peterson (1959) found trace decay because they had taken the average value for every trial. Underwood treated the trials individually and found that the performance of the first trial is the best for most of the participants and time intervals almost no effect on first performance. There is another experiment carried out by McGeoch & McDonald (1931) to test the relationship between the relatedness between lists of items and the percentage of correct recall. The time interval between learning and recall is controlled. Nevertheless, participants were allowed to have a 10-minute break before learning new list of items. As time is controlled, trace decay theory would suggest that the percentage of recall would be the same. However, the result is inconsistent with the trace decay theory. As relatedness between lists of items increase, the percentage of correct recall decreases. These two experiments disprove the existence of trace decay theory. Although interference theory seems to explain more than trace decay theory, there are still some criticisms. This discussion will begin with Jenkins and Dallenbach (1924) performed an experiment to investigate the effect of sleep on memory. The participants were told to memorise lists of items and tested after some time intervals. Some participants were asked to sleep after learning whereas others kept awake. Results showed that participants that slept can remember more items than those who awake. Later, Hockey, Davies & Gray (1972) pointed out that the time of learning had greater effect than sleeping or awake as participants

who sleep learnt items in the late evening before they sleep whereas participants who awake learnt items in the morning. They also showed that learning time is a more powerful predictor of forgetting. The effect of retroactive interference was questioned in this experiment. This experiment eliminates retroactive interference. It has been criticized that why sleeping can improve retention if proactive interference is not eliminated. In an experiment, participants were given two lists of closely associated pairs to be learnt. After eight hours of sleeping, Underwood (1960) found that retention for both lists was enhanced. Unfortunately, he had no scientific explanation for it. It is hypothesized that proactive interference is much less effective in real life than in experimental settings. Besides, interference theory provides no explanation on the forgetting that involve items that dissimilar. Although interference seems to have a predominant effect on forgetting, however in real life, interference and trace decay cannot be disentangle, both contribute to forgetting (Baddeley and Hitch, 1977). Other than that, encoding specificity principle proposed by Tulving also contributes to forgetting theory. This principle states if the retrieval cues overlap with the encoding cues, then the target memory may be remembered better, else it is known as cue-dependent forgetting, where the memory stored is inaccessible. The absences of correct cues lead to forgetting. This principle can be applied to the fact that recall is generally harder than recognition (Kintsch, 1970). For instance, we may sometimes unable to recall someones name, but if the name is told by someone else, we can immediately recognise that person. This indicates that the name of the person is the cue that overlaps between the encoding and the retrieval, satisfying encoding specificity principle. According to the experiments carried out by Tulving and Thomson (1973), when same cues are presented during learning and recalling, participants performed better than those participants who had been presented different cues during learning and recalling. Nevertheless, the internal and external environment during encoding can be important too. Godden and Baddeley (1975) carried out

an experiment on divers learning underwater and on the beach. The results are consistent with the encoding specificity principle, which shows that memory is better when the environment during recall is same as the environment during encoding. In the next experiment, Heerron and Wilding (2006) found that people can retrieve episodic memory that has forgotten when they are put in the same place and same emotional state during the event happened. Thus, performance may be better if we are put under the same condition as that of practicing. Encoding specificity principle receives a great challenege by Eysenck (1979). He proposed his idea as the discrimination forgetting, argued that the overlap between retrieval information and encoding information is not the real factor of remembering, but the cues help to discriminate between the target memory and competing memory. Competing memory is the false memory that competes with the target memory to fit in during retrieval. In one experiment, Nairne (2002) asked participants to say aloud the list of words: write, right, rite, rite, write, right. Participants were told to recall the third words in the list, provided the sound of the word. However, participants failed to recognize the target memory. Therefore, providing the cue that is overlapping with the encoding information does not really help participants to discriminate between one and another. In short, encoding specificity principle seems to follow this idea to some extent but discrimination forgetting emphasises more on distinguishing between the target memory and the competing memory. In conclusion, there is no single theory that can cover every aspects of forgetting. They are always interrelated to each other. Trace decay theory emphasizes on the memory trace, as trace disappear, information is lost from memory, which is supported by neuroscience. Interference theory suggests that memories are difficult to retrieve because of similarities. Encoding specificity principle shows that forgetting is due to lack of cues, however discrimination among target memory and competing memory is more important.

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