Abstract
This paper reports five experiments that examined memory for repeated and unrepeated pairs of words. In over 40 experimental comparisons, cued recall of the repeated pairs was better than it would have been if the words had been repeated as independent cognitive events. Therefore, memory traces do interact with other traces of the same nominal items. Our account of superadditive recall is that some encodings fail on the final test because they lack a needed piece of information. Specifically, some need additional item-specific information to enable access by the cue, and some need relational information for recall of the target. The second trial is an implicit test of memory, whose results give the system a heuristic basis for standing pat or doing more encoding. If a retrieved encoding needs less than a new one to become a success, it has a good chance of becoming a success, and recall is superadditive. However, if the ease of retrieving the encoding is for the wrong reasons, such as massed repetition, the item remains a failure, and recall is subadditive.
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The research was funded by Operating Grant A8122 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Councid of Canada to Ian Begg. Experiment 1 was part of an honors thesis by Craig Green. Many people offered comments and adv,ce at various stages of the research, ,including Ann Anas, Arthur Glenberg, Reed Hunt, Andrea Snider, Endel Tulving, and Bruce Weaver
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Begg, I., Green, C. Repetition and trace interaction: Superadditivity. Memory & Cognition 16, 232–242 (1988). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03197756
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03197756