Component-levels theory of the effects of spacing of repetitions on recall and recognition

Abstract

Spacing repetitions generally facilitates memory for the repeated events. This article describes a theory of spacing effects that uses the same principles to account for both facilitatory and inhibitory effects of spacing in a number of memory paradigms. Increasing the spacing between repetitions is assumed to result in the storage of greater amounts of information of three types or levels: contextual, structural (associative), and descriptive. Contextual information is encoded automatically, while the encoding of the structural and descriptive information depends on control processes utilized. Remembering involves accessing the stored information using retrieval cues containing information on any level that matches the stored information. The ultimate effectiveness of the spacing is controlled by this matehing between the retrieval cues and the stored information. Previous experiments demonstrating the operation of these principles on the structural and descriptive levels are reviewed. Three new experiments are reported that illustrate interactions between stored information and retrieval cues based on contextual information.The effect of arepetition has always been of great importance to all theories of learning and memory. That performance improves with repetitions is one of the basic phenomena to be explained. Nonetheless, there is not an adequate explanation of when, how, or why repetitions are effective. No single-process theory, nor many multiprocess theories, can account for all, or even most, of the empirical findings. The goal of this article is to present a theoretical framework that integrates a number of different repetition-effect phenomena and that makes a variety of new predictions.Specifica11y, the theory is designed to account for distributed practice and spacing effects found with verbal stimuli in a majority of verbal learning and memory paradigms. The distributed practice effect refers to enhanced memory performance on repeated iterns whose presentations are distributed (either through time or through time and other presentations), as opposed to performance on items whose presentations are massed or contiguous. In addition, in many situations the amount of distribution is positively correlated with performance. As the spacing, or lag, between the presentations increases, performance genera11y shows a concomitant, negatively accelerated improvement (Melton, 1970). Distributed practice effects, in one sense, have been difficult to explain because of their ubiquity across both tasks and information processing strategies (Underwood,

Why interleaving enhances inductive learning: The roles of discrimination and retrieval

“…Additionally, Kornell and Bjork's results have been replicated by Kang and Pashler (2012), Zulkiply and Burt (in press), and Wahlheim, Dunlosky, and Jacoby (2011). All of these findings seem to fit within an extensive literature on the spacing effect-that is, the finding that items studied once and restudied after a delay are recalled better in the long term than are items studied and restudied in quick succession (for reviews, see Cepeda, Pashler, Vul, Wixted, & Rohrer, 2006;Dempster, 1988;Glenberg, 1979). In all of the recent studies demonstrating the benefits of spacing for inductive learning (with the exception of Vlach et al, 2008, who did not have an interleaved condition in addition to their spaced condition), however, interleavingmixing exemplars from different categories together-was what enhanced learning, rather than temporal spacing per se-a point to which we will return shortly.…”

Not all repetition is alike: Different benefits of repetition in amnesia and normal memory

“…In keeping with our prediction, individuals with intact memory were able to take advantage of the multiple study contexts as cues to retrieve the target words, and hence, recollection was enhanced. Interestingly, using a similar contextual manipulation to that used here, Glenberg (1979) found a varied-context advantage in free and cued recall tasks, tasks that are primarily mediated by recollection. That a similar overall enhancement was not evident in the recognition task used in this study reflects the fact that recognition does not necessarily require recollection of study details, but can also be mediated by familiarity, in the absence of recollection.…”

“…The comparison of fixed versus varied repetition in individuals with intact memory has generated an extensive literature, and although some studies have suggested a benefit associated with encoding items under varied conditions (Glenberg, 1979;Klein & Saltz, 1976;Paivio, 1974), others have found either no effect or a negative effect (Postman & Knecht, 1983;Soraci et al, 1999;Young & Bellezza, 1982). While most of the research on encoding variability has entailed recall tasks, similarly conflicting results have been obtained with recognition tasks (e.g., Ciccone et al, 1975;Winograd & Geis, 1974).…”

Spacing and repetition effects in human memory: application of the SAM model

“…This article presents a new model for spacing based on the SAM theory of memory developed by Raaijmakers and Shiffrin (1980, 1981). The model is a generalization of the SAM model as applied to interference paradigms (Mensink & Raaijmakers, 1988, 1989 and may be viewed as a mathematical version of the Component-Levels theory proposed by Glenberg (1979). It is assumed that on a second presentation of an item, information is added to an existing trace if the episodic memory image corresponding to that item is retrieved.…”