How long does the modality effect persist?

Abstract

Two experiments were conducted to study the modality effect with delayed free recall. The first experiment demonstrated that both auditory and vocalized-visual presentations were superior to silent visual presentation even when recall was delayed by 15 sec. The second experiment demonstrated that a slight modality effect was obtained even after a recall delay of 60 sec if the filler task was not auditory in nature. These studies suggest either that echoic memory persists longer than was previously believed or that the modality effect and suffix effect are mediated by different mechanisms. © 1982, The Psychonomic Society, Inc.. All rights reserved.