Effects of word frequency on individual-item and serial order retention: Teste of the order-encoding view

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Abstract

The order-encoding view of the word frequency effect proposes that low-frequency (LF) items attract more attention to the encoding of individual-item information than do high-frequency (HF) items, but at the expense of order encoding (DeLosh & McDaniel, 1996). When combined with the assumption that free recall of unrelated words is organized according to their original order of presentation, this view explains the finding that HF words are better recalled than LF words in pure lists but that, in mixed lists, recall is better for LF words. The present study confirmed that in mixed lists, order memory becomes equivalent for HF and LF words and that the predicted pattern of order memory and recall holds for incidental order-encoding conditions, for longer lists than those used in previous experiments, and for lists with minimal interitem associativity. Moreover, recall from HF lists declined, but recall from LF lists improved, in related-word lists, relative to unrelated-word lists, reversing the usual pure-list free recall advantage for HF words. These results were uniquely predicted by the order-encoding account and favor this view over accessibility, interitem association, and cuing effectiveness explanations of the word frequency effect. Copyright 2006 Psychonomic Society, Inc.

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Merritt, P. S., DeLosh, E. L., & McDaniel, M. A. (2006). Effects of word frequency on individual-item and serial order retention: Teste of the order-encoding view. Memory and Cognition, 34(8), 1615–1627. https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03195924

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