Echoic and retrieval accounts of the long-term modality effect tested using the suffix procedure

The long-term modality effect is the advantage in recall of the last of a list of auditory to-be-remembered (TBR) items compared with the last of a list of visual TBR items when the list is followed by a filled retention interval. If the auditory advantage is due to echoic sensory memory mechanisms, then recall of the last auditory TBR item should be substantially reduced when it is followed by a redundant, not-to-be-recalled auditory suffix. Contrary to this prediction, Experiment 1 demonstrated that a redundant auditory suffix does not significantly reduce recall of the last auditory TBR item. In Experiment 2 a nonredundant auditory suffix produced a large reduction in the last auditory item. Redundancy is not the only factor controlling the effectiveness of a suffix, however. Experiment 3 demonstrated that a nonredundant visual suffix does not reduce recall of the last auditory TBR item. These results are discussed in reference to a retrieval account of the long-term modality effect.     

Does the testing effect depend on presentation modality?

We examined whether the testing effect generalizes to an auditory presentation modality. Five lists of unrelated words (Experiment 1) and related words (Experiment 2) were presented to participants, half of whom studied them visually and half studied them auditorily. Participants in the study-only condition performed a short distractor task following lists 1–4, whereas those in the testing condition completed a short distractor task and then attempted to recall each list. Both groups were subsequently tested on List 5 and on all five lists 30 min later. In both experiments, we found a testing effect for both List 5 and for the final cumulative recall test. However, the effect did not interact with study modality, despite the fact that proactive interference was greater following auditory study. These results have important implications for educational practice, suggesting that initial testing is important for materials presented in auditory as well as visual formats.     

Enumeration produces poor primacy for tactile presentation relative to visual and auditory presentation as the only modality effect

Methodological biases may help explain the modality effect, which is superior recall of auditory recency (end of list) items relative to visual recency items. In 1985 Nairne and McNabb used a counting procedure to reduce methodological biases, and they produced modality-like effects, such that recall of tactile recency items was superior to recall of visual recency items. The present study extended Nairne and McNabb's counting procedure and controlled several variables which may have enhanced recall of tactile end items or disrupted recall of visual end items in their study. Although the results of the present study indicated general serial position effects across tactile, visual, and auditory presentation modalities, the tactile condition showed lower recall for the initial items in the presentation list than the other two conditions. Moreover, recall of the final list item did not differ across the three presentation modalities; modality effects were not found. These results did not replicate the findings of Nairne and McNabb, or much of the past research showing superior recall of auditory recency items. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

Encoding specificity and modality effects in episodic memory

Summary A modified Brown-Peterson paradigm was employed to determine the extent to which proactive interference effects of a sensory nature would influence the occurrence of sensory encoding specificity effects in episodic memory. Subjects presented with an auditory or a visual study list of five to-be-remembered (TBR) words engaged in either an auditory or a visual arithmetic distractor task for 30 s, and then received the first word in the study list as an auditory or visual intralist retrieval cue or received no cue. Presentation of the intralist retrieval cue in the modality of the study list enhanced the effectiveness of the retrieval cue, whereas presentation of the retrieval cue in the modality of the distractor task decreased the effectiveness of the retrieval cue. Sensory encoding specificity effects were largest when the distractor task occurred in the modality opposite to the modality in which both the study list and the retrieval cue were presented.     

The Socioeconomic Status,Intelligence, and Psychometric Pattern of Native-Born White Homeless Men

Build-up of proactive interference (PI) with visual-picture and auditory-verbal input modalities and the subsequent release from PI following a change in modality was investigated in three experiments with boys and girls, as follows: Experiment I (n = 64) at two mean age levels, 7–6 and 10–5; Experiment II (n = 64) at mean age 7–6; and Experiment III (n = 48) at age 11–4. PI build-up occurred in both modalities for all ages tested. Release from PI occurred following a change from auditory to visual input but not following a visual to auditory shift. In the final experiment, this asymmetrical improvement in performance was dependent upon an interaction between the modality of the input and distractor task on the final or release trial; changing to visual input produced a release effect regardless of the distractor task modality, while auditory input was associated with improvement in recall if a visual distractor task was employed whether or not a shift in input modality had occurred. This improvement was hypothesized to represent a decrease in retroactive interference rather than a release from proactive interference.     

Immediate serial recall of mixed-modality lists

Seven experiments are reported in which subjects were tested for immediate serial recall of mixed-modality lists. On mixed auditory-visual lists, there was an advantage for auditory items at all serial positions. This was due to both a facilitation of auditory items and an inhibition of visual items on mixed lists, as compared with single-modality lists. When presented on a list containing items read silently, recall of items that were silently mouthed by the subject demonstrated patterns similar to those found with auditory items. When presented on a list containing items read aloud, recall of mouthed items showed patterns similar to those found with silently read items. The auditory advantage on mixed lists was found even when the list items were acoustically similar or identical and was not reduced by midlist auditory suffixes. The results suggest that modality differences in recall of mixed-modality lists are based on information different from that responsible for modality differences in recall of single-modality lists.     

Schedules of presentation and temporal distinctiveness in human memory

Recency, in remembering a series of events, reflects the simple fact that memory is vivid for what has just happened but deteriorates over time. Theories based on distinctiveness, an alternative to the multistore model, assert that the last few events in a series are well remembered because their times of occurrence are more highly distinctive than those of earlier items. Three experiments examined the role of temporal and ordinal factors in auditorily and visually presented lists that were temporally organized by distractor materials interpolated between memory items. With uniform distractor periods, the results were consistent with Glenberg's (1987) temporal distinctiveness theory. When the procedure was altered so that distractor periods became progressively shorter from the beginning to the end of the list, the results were consistent for only the visual modality; the auditory modality produced a different and unpredicted (by the theory) pattern of results, thus falsifying the claim that the auditory modality derives more benefit from temporal information than the visual modality. We distinguish serial order information from specifically temporal information, arguing that the former may be enhanced by auditory presentation but that the two modalities are more nearly equal with respect to the latter.     

Further evidence of interference between lipreading and auditory recency

In both free and backward recall, it is shown that auditory but not visual recency is greatly disrupted when subjects have to lipread, rather than read, a series of numbers in a distractor task interpolated between list presentation and recall. This selective interference effect extends the generality of a finding reported by Spoehr and Corin (1978) and adds to an accumulating body of evidence that seems inconsistent with acoustic or echoic memory interpretations of the enhanced recency recall typically observed in comparing auditory with visual presentation. Alternative interpretations are briefly considered.     

The auditory recency advantage in longer term free recall is not enhanced by recalling prerecency items first

Gardiner and Gregg (1979) showed that in a free-recall paradigm in which each list word is embedded in a continuous stream of subject-vocalized distractor activity, recency recall was greater when the words were presented auditorily rather than visually. The experiment described here showed that this auditory advantage persisted even when list and distractor items were both spoken at a controlled pace by the experimenter, and that it was little influenced by instructions to give priority in recall either to the beginning or to the end of the list. These results strengthen the conclusion that this effect cannot be accommodated by any echoic memory theory and, because the effect was not enhanced when prerecency items were recalled first, demonstrate an additional difference between it and the somewhat similar auditory advantage found in immediate recall.     

Recency effects in memory,as a function of modality of intervening events

Summary Word lists of fifteen items were presented to eye or to ear, with recall either immediately, or after a visual task, or after an auditory one. Instructions were to recall the last items first. An intervening task using the same modality greatly reduced recall of the last items presented; whereas a visual task did not do so for acoustically presented items. An auditory task reduced visual memory. These results suggest a specific auditory memory for recent events, over-written by subsequent auditory events.This research was supported by the Medical Research Council. The experimental work was performed at the Applied Psychology Unit, Cambridge.     

Disruption of short-term memory by distractor speech: Does content matter?

Four experiments replicate the finding that auditory distractors that are lexically identical to the visual target items dramatically increase the irrelevant-speech effect on serial recall. This effect was previously attributed to interference of incompatible order cues. The present results suggest that a different interpretation of this effect is required. Experiment 2 replicates the order congruence effect observed by Hughes and Jones (2005), but shows that this effect is most likely due to an attenuation of interference that is caused by strategic attention shifts to the nominally irrelevant material. Experiments 3 and 4 show that the between-stream similarity effect generalizes to a condition in which the distractor items were drawn from the same category as the targets, but were not identical to them. By showing that nonacoustic distractor features can increase interference in serial recall of lists of supposedly “meaningless” items such as digits or consonants, the results are most consistent with models that postulate an integration of short-term and long-term memory such as the embedded-processes model and the feature model and are inconsistent with classical structural accounts of memory.     

Boundary conditions for the modality effect: Type of material and time of test

Recall of auditory and visually presented information was studied using three different types of material. Although auditory presentation was superior for all three types of material, the size and pattern of the effect depended upon whether the visual presentation was successive or simultaneous. Successive visual presentation reduced recall performance compared to auditory presentation considerably for real sentences, while smaller effects were obtained for noun sequences and scrambled sentences. The overall supremacy in recall of auditory presented items was reduced further when compared to a simultaneous visual presentation. In the last two experiments, all effects of modality of presentation obtained in immediate recall were replicated, but were eliminated in delayed recall. The finding that this modality effect is eliminated in delayed recall is taken to indicate that semantic aspects of the material to be remembered are by and large unaffected by mode of presentation, while more superficial aspects are the ones influenced.     

The separate but related origins of the recency effect and the modality effect in free recall

The recency effect found in free recall can be accounted for almost entirely in terms of the recall of ordered sequences of items. It is such sequences, presented at the end of the stimulus list but recalled at the very beginning of the response protocol, which produce a recency effect. Such sequences are recalled at the beginning of the response protocol equally often following auditory and visual presentation. These same stimulus sequences are also frequently recalled other than initially in the response protocol following auditory presentation. However, such responses are rarely found following visual presentation. The modality effect in free recall, the advantage of auditory over visual presentation, can be substantially accounted for in these terms. Theoretical and procedural implications of these data are discussed.     

Evidence against a short-term-store account of long-term recency effects

When subjects perform a distractor task before and after every item on a list, recall of the last itemis much higher than recall of items from the middle of the list. Koppenaal and Glanzer (1990) have shown that this long-term recency effect can be eliminated by using, after the last item, a distractor task different from that used elsewhere on the list. They interpreted this finding as evidence in favor of a short-term-store account of long-term recency effects. This account is challenged by the results reported here. Practice either on the task or on time-sharing between the task and list items had little impact on the recency effect. Also, substantial recency effects were found when a different distractor task occurred after every list position. Thus, it is not true that long-term recency effects are found only when subjects have an opportunity to adapt to the distractor task. Our results are not consistent with a short-term-store account of recency effects.     

Intrusive effects of implicitly processed information on explicit memory

This study described the interference of implicitly processed information on the memory for explicitly processed information. Participants studied a list of words either auditorily or visually under instructions to remember the words (explicit study). They were then visually presented another word list under instructions which facilitate implicit but not explicit processing. Following a distractor task, memory for the explicit study list was tested with either a visual or auditory recognition task that included new words, words from the explicit study list, and words implicitly processed. Analysis indicated participants both failed to recognize words from the explicit study list and falsely recognized words that were implicitly processed as originating from the explicit study list. However, this effect only occurred when the testing modality was visual, thereby matching the modality for the implicitly processed information, regardless of the modality of the explicit study list. This "modality effect" for explicit memory was interpreted as poor source memory for implicitly processed information and in light of the procedures used. as well as illustrating an example of "remembering causing forgetting."     

Suffix effects and probe modality in probed recall: Implications for readout from sensory memory

The effect of a redundant stimulus suffix was investigated in three experiments using a probed recall task. The probe modality was auditory in the first experiment and visual in the second. In the third experiment, both probe modalities were tested. The presentation rate was varied in all three experiments and was confounded with the delay of the suffix. The suffix was found to have a small and approximately equal effect on the last six serial positions. In contrast to the predictions from Crowder and Morton's (1969) PAS model, presentation rate and suffix delay did not interact with the suffix effect. The results indicate that at least six items can be simultaneously represented in PAS, that there is no appreciable decay of information from PAS during presentation of the last list items, and that readout of PAS information does not occur either during list presentation or between the end of list presentation and the beginning of overt report.     

Abstract versus modality-specific memory representations in processing auditory and visual speech

Serial recall of lip-read, auditory, and audiovisual memory lists with and without a verbal suffix was examined. Recency effects were the same in the three presentation modalities. The disrupting effect of a suffix was largest when it was presented in the same modality as the list items. The results suggest that abstract linguistic as well as modality-specific codes play a role in memory for auditory and visual speech.     

Absence of a cross-modal “suffix effect” in short-term memory

Three experiments are reported involving the presentation of lists of either letters or digits for immediate serial recall. The main variable was the presence or absence of a suffix-prefix, an item (tick or cross) occurring at the end of the list which had to be copied before recall of the stimulus list. With auditory stimuli and an auditory suffix-prefix there was a large and selective increase in the number of errors on the last few serial positions—the typical “suffix effect”. The suffix effect was not found with auditory stimuli and a visual suffix-prefix nor with a visual stimulus and an auditory suffix-prefix. These results are interpreted as supporting a model for short-term memory proposed by Crowder and Morton (1969) in which it is suggested that with serial recall information concerning the final items following auditory presentation has a different, precategorical, origin from that concerning other items.     

The modality effect and articulation

The two experiments reported in this paper investigate the influences of irrelevant articulation on the modality effect in serial recall. Subjects performed a post-list distractor task, which involved generating a well-learned alphabetic sequence for five seconds. The modality effect was impaired when subjects vocalized the letters aloud, but was unaffected by whether the sequence was silently mouthed or silently written. These results show that the modality effect does not arise from the contribution of an articulatory code to recall of the most recent auditory items. They also question the functional equivalence of recency effects for auditory, mouthed and lipread stimuli. On the basis of these and other findings, a multi-component approach to recency effects is proposed.     

On the auditory modality superiority effect in serial recall: separating input and output factors

The modality effect in immediate recall refers to superior recall of the last few items within lists presented in spoken as opposed to printed form. The locus of this well-known effect has been unclear. N. Cowan, J. S. Saults, E. M. Elliott, and M. Moreno (2002) introduced a new method to distinguish between the effects of input serial position, output serial position, and the number of items yet to be recalled and found that large modality effects occurred only in conditions in which delay and interference at output (from items already recalled) was high. The authors replicated that finding, even when the response period included output interference acoustically similar to the spoken stimuli to be recalled. However, the authors found that output delay and interference act only by lowering the level of performance to a more sensitive range. The modality effect thus originates during encoding of the list to be recalled, not during output.