CONCRETE IMAGE AND VERBAL MEMORY CODES

Hypothesized (1) that concrete (visual) imagery functions primarily as a parallel processing system, whereas the verbal symbolic system is specialized for sequential processing; and (2) that performance in nonsequential memory tasks would accordingly vary directly with the availability of both memory codes, but the verbal code alone would be crucial in sequential memory. Ss were undergraduates. The availability of imagery was manipulated by the use of abstract words, concrete words, and easily labeled pictures as stimuli. The availability of the verbal code, in the case of pictures, was varied by presenting the stimuli at rates presumably above and below implicit labeling threshold. Immediate memory span and serial learning constituted the sequential tasks; free recall and recognition memory, the nonsequential tasks. Consistent with predictions (1) memory for pictures was significantly inferior to words only in the sequential memory tasks, and then only at the fast rate; (2) both pictures and concrete words exceeded the abstract words in serial learning at the slow rate; and (3) pictures were significantly superior to abstract words at the slow rate in both nonsequential tasks, with concrete words intermediate in each case. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved). © 1969 American Psychological Association.