Stimulus imagery and the effect of response categorization on recall in retroactive inhibition

This study deals with the interaction between characteristics of stimulus-response encoding and the effect of response categorization on recall in an A-B, A-C paradigm. After a discussion of the results of previous experiments by the present author a ‘restricted-constraint hypothesis’ is formulated. It states that category information will be used if the stimulus provides for an amount of constraint that is not sufficient for direct retrieval but still enough for identifying the response after the list as a whole has been retrieved. In the case of a high amount of constraint however, direct retrieval of the response is possible and category cues are bypassed. This hypothesis is tested by varying the Imagery-value of the noun-stimulus. A first experiment is inconclusive since the categorization effect fails to materialize. The second experiment comes out as predicted.