REPETITION EFFECTS IN IMMEDIATE MEMORY WHEN THERE ARE NO REPEATED ELEMENTS IN STIMULI

Reports 2 experiments in which 16 undergraduates recalled series of 8 consonants immediately following auditory presentation. S was required always to include 1 prearranged, redundant consonant in his recall, as a prefix before the series in Exp. I and between the 2nd and 3rd elements in Exp. II. In both studies there was a comparison of inclusive conditions, where the redundant letter also occurred as part of the memory series, with exclusive conditions, where the redundant element was never repeated in the memory series. The main finding was that patterns of output repetition in the inclusive conditions affected the form of the serial position curve, simulating, in critical cases, the effects of intraserial repetition (a repeated letter in the series as presented). Results indicate that the effects of distributed intraserial repetition are attributed chiefly to output rather than input processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved). © 1968 American Psychological Association.