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CHAPTER FIVE
A Review of Retrieval-Induced
Forgetting in the Contexts of
Learning, Eyewitness Memory,
Social Cognition,
Autobiographical Memory, and
Creative Cognition
Benjamin C. Storm*, 1, Genna Angellox, Dorothy R. Buchli{,
Rebecca H. Koppel#, Jeri L. Little** and John F. Nestojko**
*Department of Psychology, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, USA
x
Department of Psychology, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA
{
Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
#
Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
**Department of Psychology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA
1
Corresponding author: E-mail: [email protected]
Contents
1. Introduction
2. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting: The Phenomenon and Theoretical Accounts
3. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and the Use of Testing in Education
3.1 Delay and Integration
3.2 The Role of Competition
3.3 Fostering Facilitation
3.4 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
4. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and Eyewitness Memory
4.1 Methodology and Typical Results
4.2 Types of Eyewitness Information
4.3 Questions of Durability
4.4 Misinformation Effects
4.5 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
5. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and Social Cognition
5.1 Information about Other People
5.2 Stereotypes and Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
5.3 Social Judgments, Behaviors, and Decision-Making
5.4 Socially Shared Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
5.5 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
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6. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and Autobiographical Memory
6.1 Self-Relevant Memories
6.2 Individual Differences in Autobiographical Memory
6.3 Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and Depression
6.4 Remembering and Forgetting Trauma
6.5 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
7. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and Creative Cognition
7.1 A Predictor of the Ability to Overcome Fixation
7.2 Problem-Solving-Induced Forgetting
7.3 Thinking-Induced Forgetting
7.4 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
8. Broad Considerations for the Study of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting in Context
9. Conclusion
References
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Abstract
Retrieving information from memory can cause the forgetting of other information in
memory, a phenomenon referred to as retrieval-induced forgetting. Over the past
20 years, retrieval-induced forgetting has been observed in a variety of experimental
contexts and has been argued to impact a number of cognitive and psychological processes. Not simply a laboratory phenomenon, retrieval-induced forgetting appears to
have important implications for furthering our basic understanding of memory and
behavior. In the present chapter, we provide a selective review of retrieval-induced
forgetting in five contextsdlearning and education, eyewitness memory, social cognition, autobiographical memory, and creative cognitiondand discuss the importance of
studying retrieval-induced forgetting in situations beyond the typical retrieval-practice
paradigm.
1. INTRODUCTION
Over two decades ago, Michael Anderson, Robert Bjork, and
Elizabeth Bjork (1994) published a paper entitled “Remembering Can
Cause Forgetting: Retrieval Dynamics in Long-Term Memory.” The paper
presented evidence of a relatively simple phenomenon using a relatively simple paradigm. To put it succinctly, retrieving a subset of items from a category caused the forgetting of other items from that category, a finding
referred to as retrieval-induced forgetting. Although there had already
been a rich history of research on the detrimental consequences of retrieving
some items from memory on the later recall of other items in memory (e.g.,
Blaxton & Neely, 1983; Brown, 1981; Roediger & Schmidt, 1980;
Roediger, 1974, 1978; Rundus, 1973; Tulving & Arbuckle, 1966), the
paper by Anderson and colleagues inspired a new wave of research, set to
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
143
explore the dynamics of retrieval-induced forgetting in new and exciting
ways, rich with theoretical and applied implications.
The literature is now rife with theoretical reviews focused on how and
why retrieval-induced forgetting is observed (see, e.g., Anderson & Levy,
2007; Anderson, 2003; B€auml, 2007; Levy & Anderson, 2002; Raaijmakers
& Jakab, 2013; Storm & Levy, 2012; Verde, 2012), with debate focused predominately on inhibitory-based versus noninhibitory-based explanations
(for a recent meta-analysis, see Murayama, Miyatsu, Buchli, & Storm,
2014). To date, however, there have not been any systematic reviews of
the various applications of retrieval-induced forgetting as they relate to other
psychological processes and the way in which we think, behave, and
remember more generally. This lacuna is surprising given the amount of
relevant research that has attempted to extend the boundaries of the
retrieval-practice paradigm. The purpose of the current chapter is to review
the role and implications of retrieval-induced forgetting in five distinct contexts: learning and education, eyewitness memory, social cognition, autobiographical memory, and creative cognition. In the final section, we take
a broader perspective and discuss a few overarching issues for future research
to consider.
2. RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING: THE
PHENOMENON AND THEORETICAL ACCOUNTS
Although retrieval-induced forgetting has been explored in many
ways and with many materials, most research have employed some
variant of the retrieval-practice paradigm developed by Anderson, Bjork,
and Bjork (1994). In this paradigm, illustrated in Figure 1, participants first
study a list of category–exemplar pairs (e.g., fruit–orange, metal–silver, fruit–
banana, metal–copper), often consisting of several exemplars from several
categories. Participants are then presented with category-plus-stem
retrieval cues associated with half of the exemplars from half of the categories (e.g., fruit-or_____). Participants are instructed to use the cues to
retrieve the appropriate exemplars from the earlier study list. Retrieval
practice often consists of several rounds of trials, with participants
retrieving the to-be-practiced exemplars multiple times. Finally, after a
brief delay (usually 5–20 min), participants are tested on their ability to
retrieve the items from the study phase.
This retrieval-practice paradigm creates three types of items: Rpþ items,
Rp items, and Nrp items. Rpþ items are exemplars generated during
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Figure 1 Schematic showing the method (Panel A), item types (Panel B), and
results (Panel C) of the typical paradigm used to study retrieval-induced forgetting.
Anderson et al. (1994).
retrieval practice (i.e., orange); Rp items are nonpracticed exemplars from
practiced categories (i.e., banana); and Nrp items are nonpracticed exemplars
from nonpracticed categories (i.e., silver & copper). Not surprisingly, when
assessed at final test, Rpþ items are recalled best, presumably owing to the
benefits of testing that have been shown to enhance long-term memory
(see Bjork, 1975; Roediger & Karpicke, 2006). The more important finding,
at least in the current context, is that Rp items are recalled less well than Nrp
items. It is this diminished accessibility of Rp items relative to Nrp items that
is referred to as the empirical phenomenon of retrieval-induced forgetting
(Anderson et al., 1994).
Although we now suffer from the hindsight bestowed by 20 years of
research on retrieval-induced forgetting, it is important to note that there
were reasons to think that the accessibility of Rp items might profit, not suffer, from the retrieval practice of Rpþ items. The idea of spreading activation,
for example, which is prominent in some associative models of memory, might
predict that strengthening some exemplars of a category would strengthen
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
145
other exemplars of that category (e.g., Loftus, 1973; Warren, 1977). Indeed,
participants might rehearsedovertly or covertlydrelated nontarget exemplars during retrieval practice, potentially making such items more recallable
in the future than they would have been otherwise. Despite these possibilities,
retrieval-induced forgetting has proven to be remarkably robust. According to
Murayama et al. (2014) meta-analysis, the average effect size is 8.7%
(CI95% ¼ 7.5%, 9.8%), an estimate that probably underestimates the true effect
size because the analysis included studies and manipulations that were specifically designed to prevent or even reverse the effect of forgetting.
In addition to semantically associated categories, retrieval-induced
forgetting has been observed with visual scenes (e.g., Shaw, Bjork, &
Handal, 1995), event narratives (e.g., MacLeod, 2002), visuospatial materials
(e.g., Ciranni & Shimamura, 1999), propositions (e.g., Anderson & Bell,
2001), mathematic operations (e.g., Phenix & Campbell, 2004), motor
actions (e.g., Tempel & Frings, 2013), goals (e.g., McCulloch, Aarts, Fujita,
& Bargh, 2008), languages (Levy, McVeigh, Marful, & Anderson, 2007),
scripts (García-Bajos & Migueles, 2013), spatial locations (G
omez-Ariza,
Fernandez, & Bajo, 2012), phonological categories (Bajo, G
omez-Ariza,
Fernandez, & Marful, 2006), word-fragment completion tasks (Healey,
Campbell, Hasher, & Ossher, 2010), self-performed actions (e.g., Sharman,
2011), and autobiographical memories (e.g., Barnier, Hung, & Conway,
2004), to name just a few examples. Furthermore, retrieval-induced forgetting has been found using a number of different final test formats, including
category-cued recall, category-plus-stem-cued recall, and item recognition.
There are conditions in which retrieval-induced forgetting is not observed,
but by and large, the phenomenon has proven to be more the rule than the
exception.
According to inhibition-based accounts of retrieval-induced forgetting,
attempting to retrieve target items during retrieval practice (i.e., Rpþ
items) triggers the inappropriate activation of related nontarget items
(i.e., Rp items), causing competition. Inhibition is argued to reduce
the accessibility of the competing nontarget items, thus rendering them
less recallable in the future than they would have been otherwise. In this
way, inhibition is posited to function as an adaptive mechanism that causes
the forgetting of nontarget items in order to facilitate the retrieval of target
items (for reviews, see Anderson, 2003; B€auml, 2007; Norman, Newman,
& Detre, 2007; Storm & Levy, 2012).
Although most proponents of inhibition-based accounts agree that inhibition functions to resolve competition during retrieval practice, the specific
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way in which it does so remains a topic of debate. For example, inhibition
has been argued to act at the level of the representation, rendering nontarget
items less accessible given any potential retrieval cue (Anderson & Spellman,
1995; Anderson, 2003). Inhibition has also been argued to act in a more cuespecific manner that reduces the accessibility of nontarget items specifically
in relation to the cues that inappropriately activated them (Perfect et al.,
2004). Of course, these two possibilities are not mutually exclusive. Furthermore, it is unclear exactly what cognitive and neural processes underlie inhibition. Whereas some have argued that inhibition is accomplished via the
same type of frontally mediated executive control processes that control
thought and behavior more generally (e.g., Levy & Anderson, 2002; Marsh,
S€
orqvist, Beaman, & Jones, 2013; Roman, Soriano, G
omez-Ariza, & Bajo,
2009), others have argued that inhibition could be supported by executive
processes, but accomplished more locally in the medial temporal lobe
(Norman et al., 2007).
According to noninhibitory-based accounts, inhibition is unnecessary to
explain retrieval-induced forgetting (e.g., Jonker, Seli, & MacLeod, 2013;
MacLeod, Dodd, Sheard, Wilson, & Bibi, 2003; Raaijmakers & Jakab,
2013; Verde, 2012). For example, Rp items may suffer forgetting because
of increased competition from Rpþ items at final test. More specifically,
retrieval practice may strengthen Rpþ items, thus increasing the extent to
which those items interfere with the recall of Rp items. Recent work
by Jonker and colleagues has suggested that retrieval practice may also
induce a change in context between study and final test that makes it
more difficult to retrieve Rp items, presumably because participants are
then inappropriately cued to search the retrieval-practice context instead
of the study context for Rp items, something they would be unlikely to
do in their search for Nrp items.
Most proponents of inhibition-based accounts agree that noninhibitory mechanismsdsuch as those related to strength-based interference
and contextual cuingdcan lead to retrieval-induced forgetting. The
question is whether noninhibitory mechanisms are sufficient to account
for all observations of retrieval-induced forgetting. Several findings suggest they are not. For example, evidence pertaining to cue independence
(e.g., Anderson & Spellman, 1995; Anderson, Green, & McCulloch, 2000;
Weller, Anderson, G
omez-Ariza, & Bajo, 2013), competition dependence
(e.g., Anderson et al., 1994; Shivde & Anderson, 2001; Storm, Bjork, &
Bjork, 2007), strength independence (Anderson, Bjork, & Bjork, 2000;
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
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B€auml, 2002; Storm, Bjork, Bjork, & Nestojko, 2006), and individual differences (e.g., Aslan & B€auml, 2011; Storm & Angello, 2010; Storm &
White, 2010), as well as neurobiological work (e.g., Hanslmayr, Staudigl,
Aslan, & B€auml, 2010; Kuhl, Dudukovic, Kahn, & Wagner, 2007;
Penolazzi, Stramaccia, Braga, Mondini, & Galfano, 2014), has provided
strong support for the idea that inhibition plays at least some role in causing
retrieval-induced forgetting. Although some researchers have failed to
replicate these findings and/or disagreed with their interpretations (e.g.,
Jakab & Raaijmakers, 2009; Verde & Perfect, 2011; Williams & Zacks,
2001), the results of Murayama et al. (2014) meta-analysis suggest that
much of the evidence supporting a role for inhibition remains on solid
empirical ground (for a recent progress report on the inhibitory account,
see Storm & Levy, 2012).
Obviously, specifying a more precise model of the theoretical mechanisms underlying retrieval-induced forgetting is paramount, not only for
developing theories of memory and inhibition in cognition, but for understanding the ways in which the phenomenon might impact other cognitive
and psychological processes, in the laboratory and beyond. That said, the
applied implications of retrieval-induced forgetting need not be constrained
by the particular theoretical mechanism(s) responsible for forgetting.
Although researchers have paid much attention to determining the underlying theoretical mechanisms that produce retrieval-induced forgettingdand rightly sodthe consequences of such forgetting may have
significant implications regardless of the particular mechanism by which it
is produced. Thus, the current review will focus on retrieval-induced forgetting in the broader sense (i.e., any forgetting caused by retrieval) and will not
be limited to instantiations of forgetting believed to be the aftereffects of inhibition during retrieval practice.
It should be noted that the five areas of work reviewed in the present
chapter represent only a sample of the ways in which retrieval-induced
forgetting has the potential to influence our everyday lives and psychological
functions. We selected these areas in part because they represent areas that
have received substantial empirical attention, but also because they are of
particular interest to us. We encourage readers to consider exploring other
areas as well. It also deserves emphasis that our reviews are not meant to
be exhaustive. Instead, we focus on a sample of relevant studies hoping to
give the reader a glimpse at what is known, what is not known, and where
research in each area might be headed.
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3. RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING AND THE USE
OF TESTING IN EDUCATION
We begin by focusing on the potential implications of retrievalinduced forgetting for the use of testing in education. In recent years,
researchers have increasingly championed the use of testing as a means of
producing new learning. Research has shown that tests do more than measure memorydthey modify memory (Bjork, 1975), rendering information
retrieved during tests more recallable in the future than it would have been
otherwise, and to an extent greater than that which would have been
observed with additional study (e.g., Rawson & Dunlosky, 2011; Roediger
& Butler, 2011; Roediger & Karpicke, 2006). A clear implication of this
research is that testing has the potential to improve student performance
on subsequent tests when the same information is tested again. In practice,
however, instructors often do not test the same information multiple times.
Instead, for example, they often opt to test some information on a quiz and
then other (possibly related) information on a later exam (Fadler, Bugg,
McDaniel, & Liu, 2014). Additionally, instructors hopedat the conclusion
of their course, and perhaps beyonddthat students will remember more
than just what was tested. From an educational standpoint, therefore, it is
important to understand how retrieving some information on a test might
influence the retention of other information that was not initially tested.
Retrieval-induced forgetting has been observed using a variety of
education-like materials (e.g., Camp & De Bruin, 2008; Carroll,
Campbell-Ratcliffe, Murnane, & Perfect, 2007; Chan, 2009; Little, Storm,
& Bjork, 2011; Macrae & MacLeod, 1999). Macrae and MacLeod, for
example, investigated retrieval-induced forgetting with a paradigm constructed to mimic an educational situation. Participants studied facts about
two fictitious islands, Tok and Bilu (e.g., “The official language in Tok is
French”; “Bilu’s only major export is copper”), and then practiced retrieving
half of the facts about one of the islands. At final test, participants were less
likely to recall the nonpracticed facts about the practiced island (Rp items)
than the nonpracticed facts about the nonpracticed island (e.g., Nrp items).
Following this initial investigation, others have examined retrieval-induced
forgetting with more elaborate educational materials, often with the goal of
clarifying the conditions under which forgetting does, and does not, occur.
Two conditions that appear to be particularly relevant in this context are the
nature of the retention interval between retrieval practice and final test, and
the extent to which to-be-learned information is integrated.
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149
3.1 Delay and Integration
With regard to retention interval, there is some evidence that retrievalinduced forgetting is eliminated when the delay between retrieval practice
and final test is longer than 24 h (e.g., Carroll et al., 2007; Chan, 2009;
MacLeod & Macrae, 2001; Saunders, Fernandes, & Kosnes, 2009). The
reduction in retrieval-induced forgetting over a delay was presumed because
even if retrieval practice caused nonpracticed information to be forgotten
initially, that forgetting might be reversed over time, thus allowing the nonpracticed information to regain its initial accessibility. For educators and students alike, this reduction in forgetting over a delay would seem
advantageous, limiting the potential deleterious effects of retrieval-induced
forgetting. More recently, however, research has shown that retrievalinduced forgetting can persist across days or even a week (García-Bajos,
Migueles, & Anderson, 2009; Migueles & García-Bajos, 2007; Storm, Bjork,
& Bjork, 2012; Storm et al., 2006). The extent to which retrieval-induced
forgetting persists remains an open question, but the results of Murayama
et al. (2014) meta-analysis suggest that retrieval-induced forgetting may
persist long after retrieval practice has taken place. Moreover, as some
have noted, short-term effects of retrieval-induced forgetting can lead to
long-term effects if the initial forgetting reduces the extent to which some
information benefits from the positive consequences of subsequent retrieval
and rehearsal (e.g., Storm et al., 2006).
With regard to the integration of to-be-learned information, a number
of studies have shown that episodic or semantic integration of Rpþ and
Rp items can protect Rp items from retrieval-induced forgetting (e.g.,
Anderson & McCulloch, 1999; Anderson, Green, et al., 2000; Goodmon
& Anderson, 2011). Building on this evidence, several researchers have
hypothesized that retrieval-induced forgetting should be reduced or eliminated using educational materials that foster the integration of to-belearned information (Camp & De Bruin, 2008; Carroll et al., 2007; Chan,
2009; Little et al., 2011). For example, providing material in the form of
coherent text might offer the integration necessary to protect nonpracticed
information from being forgotten, whereas providing the same material in a
random order (i.e., as facts) would not (as was observed in the aforementioned study by Macrae & MacLeod, 1999).
To address the influence of delay and integration with educationally
relevant materials, Chan (2009) had participants read a passage about
Toucans. Half of the participants read the passage intact (coherent
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condition), whereas the other half read the passage as a series of random facts
(randomized condition). Importantly, the individual sentences across the
two conditions were identical. Participants were then tested on some of
the information immediately, and then tested on that previously tested
information as well as other related, but initially nontested information after
either a 20-min or 24-h delay. In the randomized condition, retrievalinduced forgetting was observed after the 20-min delay, but not after the
24-h delay. In the coherent condition, retrieval-induced forgetting was
not observed at all. In fact, participants in the coherent condition exhibited
a significant retrieval-induced facilitation effect after 24 h (see also, Chan,
McDermott, & Roediger, 2006).
The work of Chan and colleagues suggests that presenting information in
the form of coherent prose can protect learners from retrieval-induced
forgetting and even produce benefits in that information related to tested information becomes more recallable after a delay than it would have been
otherwise. The costs associated with retrieval practice appear to dissipate
with delay, whereas the benefits persist. Other researchers have come to
similar conclusions in related lines of work, each showing that text, and
particularly coherent text, can afford protection from forgetting (Little
et al., 2011; Experiments 1 & 2; Camp & De Bruin, 2008; but see; Carroll
et al., 2007). Interestingly, Carroll et al. (Experiment 1) found that expertise
reduced retrieval-induced forgetting, possibly because experts (but not
novices) were able to fit new information into a coherent mental model
that protected it from forgetting. Thus, the susceptibility of certain educational materials to forgetting may depend heavily on students’ level of
domain-specific knowledge.
3.2 The Role of Competition
Although learning information in the form of coherent prose may reduce
retrieval-induced forgetting under certain circumstances, it does not always
do so. In the aforementioned work investigating retrieval-induced forgetting for text materials (Chan, 2009; Chan et al., 2006), initially tested and
untested information were not necessarily competitive. In fact, Chan and
colleagues specifically designed the materials in such a way that thinking
of one fact would have helped participants remember the other fact.
Thus, given that competition between Rpþ and Rp items is assumed
to be necessary for retrieval-induced forgetting to occur (Anderson et al.,
1994; Shivde & Anderson, 2001; Storm et al., 2007; for a review, see Storm
& Levy, 2012)dat least according to inhibition-based accountsdit is not
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
151
surprising that Chan and colleagues failed to observe forgetting when their
noncompetitive Rpþ and Rp items were integrated in coherent text.
Although competition is not always present in educational contexts,
there are many situations in which it is (e.g., learning about different countries in a geography course, learning about different parts of the body in
anatomy). Little et al. (2011; Experiment 3), for example, had participants
study passages about the geography, climate, and people of six different regions of the world (e.g., lowest temperature, predominant ethnicity of people) and then practice recalling information about half of the regions. They
found that trying to recall information about half of the regions impaired
participants’ later ability to recall similar information about the other half
of the regions. The information was presented in a coherent manner, but
tested and untested information came from different passages, thus preventing the Rpþ and Rp items from being episodically or semantically integrated in a way that would protect them from forgetting. In fact, because
similar types of information were learned in relation to each of the regions,
there would have likely been considerable competition during the initial test
such that participants would have needed to inhibit the information related
to the climate of the untested regions, for example, to help them remember
the information related to the climates of the tested regions.
More recently, Little, Bjork, Bjork, and Angello (2012) asked participants to read passages about the planet Saturn and Yellowstone National
Park, constructed with information that was intended to be competitive
(i.e., descriptions of several geysers, explorers, dates). Answering cuedrecall questions about Yellowstone (e.g., the largest geyser) impaired participants’ ability to recall related but initially untested information about
Yellowstone (e.g., about the oldest geyser), as compared to untested information pertaining to the other studied topic. Thus, even information from
the same passage can suffer retrieval-induced forgetting if the information is
competitive. Taken together, these findings suggest that coherent prose does
not always protect to-be-learned information from retrieval-induced forgetting, pointing to competition between tested and untested information as a
crucial factor in determining whether or not forgetting is observed.
3.3 Fostering Facilitation
So where does this leave us in terms of selective testing in educational contexts? One concern is that although (1) a noncompetitive relationship
between tested and untested information, (2) coherence (e.g., in the form
of text or expertise), and (3) long delays between retrieval practice and final
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testing can reduce retrieval-induced forgetting or even lead to retrievalinduced facilitation, these attributes are not always present in educational
contexts. For example, course material often consists of information that
causes competition with other information, learners often lack expertise,
and information is often studied in a manner that is not integrative (e.g., flash
cards). And although teachers are unlikely to administer quizzes less than
24 h prior to a more comprehensive test (thus reducing the likelihood of
retrieval-induced forgetting on that test), students often self-quiz (e.g.,
with flash cards or practice tests) right before the exam, thus rendering nonpracticed information vulnerable to retrieval-induced forgetting.
The question then is, under these conditions, what can be done to
reduce or even reverse retrieval-induced forgetting in classroom settings?
Recent research has suggested two possibilities: first, offering a chance to
restudy information after initial testing, and second, using alternative test
formats that protect against forgetting. Results pertaining to work investigating these two possibilities are shown in Figure 2. To examine the former,
using the regions of the world materials, Little et al. (2011; Experiment 4)
demonstrated that although selective testing of some information induced
the forgetting of information pertaining to other regions (as shown by the
first pair of bars in panel A), when given a chance to restudy the untested
Figure 2 Percentage of Rp and Nrp items correctly recalled on a final test as a function of restudy condition (Panel A) and initial test type (Panel B). As shown in the first
pair of bars in each panel, retrieval-induced forgetting was observed following a cuedrecall test with no restudy opportunity. When restudy occurred following a cued-recall
test, or when an initial multiple-choice testdrather than an initial cued-recall testdwas
given, forgetting was eliminated (in the left and right panels, respectively). Panel A is
adapted from Little et al. (2011); Experiment 4, by permission from Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
Panel B is adapted from Little et al. (2012); Experiment 1.
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
153
information again, forgetting was eliminated (as shown by the second pair of
bars in panel A). These results are consistent with the findings of Storm,
Bjork, and Bjork (2008), showing that items subjected to retrievalinduced forgetting and then restudied benefit more from such restudy
than items that were not subjected to retrieval-induced forgetting. Thus,
as long as the to-be-learned material is reviewed at a later time, initial effects
of retrieval-induced forgetting may not only be inconsequential, but they
may under some conditions be beneficial.
Pertaining to the use of alternative test formats, retrieval-induced forgetting can be eliminated and even reversed by using multiple-choice tests
instead of cued-recall or free-recall tests (Little et al., 2012). To clarify, in
addition to exploring whether forgetting might occur for competitive information presented in text when cued-recall tests are used, Little et al. (2012)
examined whether multiple-choice tests might protect competitive information from retrieval-induced forgetting. Little et al. measured retrievalinduced forgetting for the answer to a related, but initially untested question
when that answer had served as an incorrect alternative on an earlier
multiple-choice question. For example, participants might have answered
a multiple-choice question about the largest geyser in Yellowstone National
Park, with four alternatives that were presented in the text: Steamboat Geyser,
Daisy Geyser, Castle Geyser, and Old Faithful. Although answering a cuedrecall question about the largest geyser on the initial test impaired one’s
ability to answer the related question about the oldest geyser (as shown by
the first pair of bars in panel B of Figure 2), answering a multiple-choice
question for which the answer to the related question served as an incorrect
alternative protected that information from being forgotten (as shown by the
second pair of bars in panel B; Experiment 1) and even facilitated its later
retrieval (Experiment 2). Little and Bjork (2010) provided evidence that
such facilitation did not occur simply as a consequence of prior exposure
to the answer in the form of an incorrect alternative. Moreover, pertaining
directly to educational settings, Bjork, Little, and Storm (2014) recently
found that answering multiple-choice quiz questions improved performance
for related questions on a later exam in the context of an undergraduate
research methods course.
3.4 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
Many questions remain about the implications of retrieval-induced forgetting in educational contexts. One potential positive role for retrievalinduced forgetting involves the unlearning of errors and misconceptions.
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Students commonly enter science courses with misconceptions (diSessa,
1988), and the replacement of such misconceptions with appropriate
conceptions is a critical goal in science education (Hammer, 1996).
The question of whether misconceptions might be eliminated through
intentional retrieval practice of appropriate conceptions (or information
associated with them) would be an interesting avenue for future research.
That said, there is substantial evidence that retrieval practice can also
cause the forgetting of information that one wants to remember (B€auml
& Samenieh, 2010; Storm et al., 2007), and there is some evidence, which
we will discuss in more detail below in the section on eyewitness memory,
that retrieval practice has the potential to make learners vulnerable to misinformation (e.g., Chan, Thomas, & Bulevich, 2009; Saunders & MacLeod,
2002). Thus, if earlier-learned information is forgotten due to the retrieval
of new information, it is possible that the earlier-learned information would
actually be more susceptible to misinformation and the introduction of misconceptions than it would have been otherwise. Clearly this is an important
topic for researchers and educators to pursuedas retrieval may propagate,
rather than eliminate, erroneous ideas.
Although we have discussed the effects of testing and retrieval on the individual, relevant dynamics occur in group settings as well. For example, students often work together in preparation for exams, quizzing each other or
explaining course material to one another. And students may not need to
engage in overt retrieval attempts to suffer forgetting, because one person’s
recall has been shown to cause another person’s forgettingda phenomenon
referred to as socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting (e.g., Cuc, Koppel, &
Hirst, 2007). Simply listening to and monitoring another person’s attempts
to retrieve some subset of information may be sufficient to cause students to
lose access to nonretrieved information. In fact, to provide an example, it is
possible that asking one student to answer a question in class might have the
potential to cause all students to forget related, nonretrieved information.
Finally, little work has examined retrieval-induced forgetting with more
extensive practice, particularly across longer delays. Chan’s (2009) work suggests that retrieval-induced forgetting does not persist with longer delays, at
least for educational materials and when the Rpþ items are only tested in
one session, but other work suggests that retrieval-induced forgetting can
persist (e.g., Storm et al., 2012). How repeated practice of certain information over days and weeks might lead to persistent forgetting of untested
information is yet to be investigated. To the extent that untested items
pertain to information that one wants to forget (e.g., misconceptions),
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such retrieval practice may be quite beneficial for learning; to the extent that
untested items pertain to information that one does not want to forget,
however, such retrieval practice may serve as an impediment for learning.
4. RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING AND
EYEWITNESS MEMORY
The ability to remember witnessed events accurately and comprehensively is critical to the functioning of our justice system. When witnesses are
inaccurate, or unable to recall certain events they have experienced, innocent suspects may be incarcerated, and guilty suspects can be set free. Unfortunately, the same processes (e.g., interference, inhibition, forgetting, and
distortion) that underlie our imperfect memory for the types of information
studied in the laboratory also underlie the encoding and retrieval of eyewitness events (MacLeod, 2002). The present section focuses on research examining whether retrieval-induced forgetting plays a role in producing
eyewitness memory inaccuracies, and how such inaccuracies occur.
The likelihood of retrieval-induced forgetting affecting eyewitness
memory seems quite high given that eyewitnesses are typically cued to recall
only portions of a witnessed event. Although police interrogators, friends
and family, and lawyers may try to be exhaustive in their questioning, it
seems unlikely, if not impossible, that they would actually be able to do
so. The extent to which questioning is limited in scope can be further exacerbated when interrogators become overly concerned with specific details of
the crime, or when police are in the initial fact-gathering phase of an investigation. Moreover, because police do not have access to all of the details of a
crimedwhich is why eyewitnesses are questioned in the first placedthey
are not able to ask the full range of questions that would elicit more complete recall. Thus, when officers question witnesses, they are likely to ask
questions relevant to only a subset of the information from an incident.
For example, based on initial reports from the scene of a crime, an officer
may ask a witness about certain objects (e.g., a purse that was reportedly stolen), but not about other objects later revealed to also be important (e.g., a
backpack worn by the culprit). When direct questioning of this type is
employed, police interrogations solicit incomplete retrievals from eyewitnesses, creating conditions similar to that of the retrieval-practice paradigm.
If a witness recalls details about the stolen purse, access to details related to
the culprit’s backpack may be impaired. When eyewitnesses retrieve selected
aspects of an incident, other potentially important aspects of the incident
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may become subject to retrieval-induced forgetting. In support of these
arguments, retrieval-induced forgetting has now been found in nearly a
dozen published experiments involving laboratory proxies of eyewitness
events (Camp, Wesstein, & De Bruin, 2012; García-Bajos et al., 2009;
MacLeod, 2002; Migueles & García-Bajos, 2006, 2007, Experiment 2;
Saunders & MacLeod, 2006; Shaw et al., 1995).
4.1 Methodology and Typical Results
The eyewitness retrieval-practice paradigm typically follows the approach
devised by Shaw et al. (1995; described in more detail below), which involves some slight modifications of the original retrieval-practice paradigm
(Anderson et al., 1994). First, in lieu of a list of category–exemplar pairs,
the study phase involves narrative descriptions, pictures, or videos of fictional
crime scenes. Second, instead of category-plus-two-letter-stem retrieval
cues, the retrieval-practice phase usually involves a series of questions about
specific features of the incident arranged in order of increasing difficulty.
Finally, instead of category-plus-letter-stem-cued recall that controls for
output interference (Roediger & Schmidt, 1980), the final test typically
involves free recall or category-cued recall.
As shown in Table 1, experiments investigating retrieval-induced forgetting in eyewitness memory have typically used materials that approximate
eyewitness incidents, such as narrative descriptions (Migueles & GarcíaBajos, 2006; Saunders & MacLeod, 2006), pictures (MacLeod, 2002;
Shaw et al., 1995), or videos (Camp et al., 2012; García-Bajos et al.,
2009; Migueles & García-Bajos, 2007; Odinot, Wolters, & Lavender,
2009) of fictional crime scenes. Experiments with narratives have described
a house from which items were stolen (Saunders & MacLeod, 2006) and
actions performed during a mugging of an elderly woman (Migueles &
García-Bajos, 2006). Experiments employing pictures as study materials
have shown items stolen from two houses (electrical goods and nonelectrical
goods; MacLeod, 2002), women collecting money for a fraudulent fundraiser (MacLeod, 2002), and a bedroom from which objects (college textbooks and college sweatshirts) were stolen (Shaw et al., 1995). Videos
used as study materials have depicted a person being robbed while
withdrawing money from a cash machine (Camp et al., 2012; Migueles &
García-Bajos, 2007), a bank robbery (García-Bajos et al., 2009), and events
leading up to a car crash (Odinot et al., 2009). The mode of study does not
appear to have an effect: Retrieval-induced forgetting has been observed, in
some form, in every eyewitness context in which it has been investigated.
Table 1 Eyewitness memory retrieval-induced forgetting experiments
Publication
Study mode & materials
Offender characteristics (haircut)
Actions performed during robbery
(robber demands money)
Household objects (microwave; bracelet)
Yes
Yes
Yes
General details from the pictures
Yes
Household objects (bookcase; armchair)
Yes
Script of actions from a mugging
Actions during a mugging (mugger
threatens victim)
Yes &
No*
Video of a robbery at a cash machine
Actions during a robbery (robbers take
a man’s money)
No
Video of a robbery at a cash machine
Offender characteristics (goatee; round face)
Yes
Video of events leading up to a car crash
Narratives about two house burglaries
General details from the video
Household objects (computer; necklace)
No
Yes
Narratives about two house burglaries
Household objects (computer; necklace)
Yes &
No**
Narratives about two house burglaries
Household objects (telescope; guitar)
Yes
Picture slides of objects in a student’s
apartment
Objects (college sweatshirts; college
textbooks)
Video of a robbery at a cash machine
Video of a bank robbery
Picture slides of objects stolen from houses
Picture slides of a fraudulent charity
collection
Narratives about two house burglaries
* RIF was observed for low- but not high-typicality Rp-items.
** RIF was observed on an immediate but not 24-h delayed final test.
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RIF
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Camp et al. (2012)
García-Bajos et al.
(2009)
MacLeod (2002,
Exp 1)
MacLeod (2002,
Exp 2)
MacLeod and
Saunders (2005)
Migueles and
García-Bajos
(2006)
Migueles and
García-Bajos
(2007, Exp 1)
Migueles and
García-Bajos
(2007, Exp 2)
Odinot et al. (2009)
Saunders and
MacLeod (2002,
Exp 1)
Saunders and
MacLeod (2002,
Exp 2)
Saunders and
MacLeod (2006)
Shaw et al. (1995)
Type of information practiced
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4.2 Types of Eyewitness Information
Crime scenes consist of many types of information that are potentially
important to criminal cases. Research has demonstrated that retrievalinduced forgetting can occur for at least three broad types of information
relevant to eyewitness memory: objects present in the scene of a crime
(MacLeod, 2002; Saunders & MacLeod, 2006; Shaw et al., 1995), offender
characteristics (Camp et al., 2012; MacLeod, 2002, Experiment 2; Migueles
& García-Bajos, 2006), and low-typicality actions performed by offenders
during an incident (García-Bajos et al., 2009; Migueles & García-Bajos,
2006, 2007).
In the first published investigation of retrieval-induced forgetting in
eyewitness memory, Shaw et al. (1995) told participants to imagine they
noticed their wallet was missing when they were at a college party. Participants then viewed a series of images depicting the inside of a student’s apartment. The pictures included two categories of itemsdcollege textbooks and
college sweatshirtsdwith eight items in each category. After viewing the
images, participants were asked questions for half of the items from one of
the two categories. This retrieval-practice phase included three rounds of
increasingly difficult questions (e.g., Round 1: “Was there a Harvard sweatshirt on the desk?” Round 2: “Was there a gray sweatshirt on the desk? If so,
what was the name of the university on that sweatshirt?” Round 3: “Were
there any sweatshirts on the desk? What was written on those sweatshirts?”).
After a 5-min delay, participants attempted to recall the items from each of
the two categories (college textbooks and college sweatshirts). Clear evidence of retrieval-induced forgetting was observed. Specifically, nonpracticed objects from nonpracticed categories were recalled less well than
were objects from practiced categories. Similar results have since been
observed in later studies (e.g., MacLeod, 2002; Saunders & MacLeod,
2006). Importantly, this later work has also shown that retrieval-induced
forgetting is observed when participants are not provided specific category
labels for the objects, which may be more akin to real eyewitness experiences because police interrogators typically do not provide category cues
to elicit a person’s recollection of a witnessed event.
Offender characteristics may also be susceptible to retrieval-induced
forgetting. Sketch artists and other interrogators, for example, extensively
question witnesses about the physical characteristics of perpetrators, and accuracy of these details often determines whether the correct suspect (i.e., the
guilty perpetrator) is taken into custody. When an eyewitness recalls one
physical feature of a perpetrator, does this cause other features to be
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forgotten? To answer this question, Camp et al. (2012) showed participants a
brief video of two perpetrators (Offender A and Offender B) robbing a person at a cash machine, followed by questions about half of the characteristics
of one of the two offenders. The retrieval practice questions closely approximated the types of questions asked by police interrogators (e.g., “What kind
of haircut did the offender have?”). As shown by subsequent recall performance, retrieval practice for some characteristics (e.g., the haircut of
Offender A) caused the forgetting of other characteristics (e.g., the color
of Offender A’s pants). Interestingly, forgetting was also observed for similar
characteristics of the nonpracticed offender (e.g., the haircut of Offender B),
suggesting that retrieval-induced forgetting can occur across categories with
eyewitness materials (for additional examples of retrieval-induced forgetting
of perpetrator characteristics, see MacLeod, 2002, Experiment 2; Migueles
& García-Bajos, 2006).
Another important aspect of crime scenes is the actions performed by
perpetrators as they commit crimes. Court decisions are often determined
by the sequence of events, the exact wording used by an offender, or other
actions performed, so accuracy for these details is important. In a series of
studies, Migueles and colleagues (García-Bajos et al., 2009; Migueles &
García-Bajos, 2006, 2007) have demonstrated an important boundary condition upon the influence of retrieval-induced forgetting in eyewitness
memory. In their studies, offenders were depicted as performing actions
that were either highly typical (“The bank robbers threaten the people at
gunpoint”) or not highly typical (“A robber points his gun at a security
guard’s neck”) of the type of crime they were depicted committing (a
bank robbery, in this example). Retrieval-induced forgetting was found
for low-typicality actions but not for high-typicality actions, a finding that
the authors argued illustrates integration as a boundary condition of
retrieval-induced forgetting (Anderson & McCulloch, 1999). That is,
high-typicality actions are connected via a schema that many people hold
in memory, and that schema may guide recall and protect nonpracticed
details from impairment. Low-typicality actions may not be well integrated
within existing schemas, thus leaving them susceptible to retrieval-induced
forgetting.
4.3 Questions of Durability
How long does retrieval-induced forgetting last for eyewitness events? Most
of the extant research examining retrieval-induced forgetting of eyewitness
memory has involved very short delays (e.g., 5 min) between retrieval
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practice and test (Camp et al., 2012; MacLeod, 2002; Migueles & GarcíaBajos, 2006; Saunders & MacLeod, 2006; Shaw et al., 1995), but real eyewitnesses can be questioned weeks or months before they have to recount
their experience in court. If retrieval-induced forgetting following initial
interrogation is short lived, then the justice system need not worry about
this memory impairment in criminal cases, because it would not affect an
eyewitness’s long-term recall. There are reasons to believe, however, that
retrieval-induced forgetting of eyewitness information may not be short
lived. Although the literature has been mixed (e.g., MacLeod & Macrae,
2001; Storm et al., 2012), retrieval-induced forgetting has been found to
be surprisingly durable (Murayama et al., 2014).
There is also evidence in eyewitness experiments of retrieval-induced
forgetting persisting as long as 1 week after practice questioning (García-Bajos
et al., 2009), though a longer interval of 2 weeks did not produce an effect
(Odinot et al., 2009). The long-term detrimental effects of retrievalinduced forgetting may be underestimated by the current literature, however,
when typical interrogation procedures are considered. Eyewitnesses are often
questioned repeatedly across many days, with the probable outcome that
successfully retrieved information continues to be additionally strengthened,
while information initially omitted from recall becomes further impaired during each new recollection attempt. After prolonged selective practice
and selective strengtheningdthat is, by the time witnesses take the stand at
trialdcertain aspects of the crime are deeply strengthened, while others
may be all but lost. In this sense, repeated retrieval practice over long periods
of time may have a cascading effect on subsequent memory strengthening and
integration that goes well beyond the initial effects of retrieval-induced forgetting, a possibility that research has yet to explore.
Another factor that does not bode well for the idea that eyewitnesses are
likely to recover forgotten memories of an event is that retrieval-induced
forgetting is observed not only on tests of recall, but on tests of recognition
as well (e.g., Aslan & B€auml, 2011; Hicks & Starns, 2004; Murayama et al.,
2014; Roman, et al., 2009; Verde, 2004). This finding suggests that eyewitnesses may not even be able to recognize aspects of witnessed events accurately following the selective retrieval practice of other aspects of those
events. One might imagine that the ability to recognize forgotten information might vary as a function of the nature of the material, however, and it
remains possible that such effects would not be observed in some eyewitness
scenarios, such as with events or experiences that are highly distinct or
emotionally salient.
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4.4 Misinformation Effects
An area of particular interest to eyewitness researchers is the distortion of
memory as a result of misleading statements or questioning. One interesting
discovery is that retrieval-induced forgetting may leave forgotten information vulnerable to misinformation effects (MacLeod & Saunders, 2005,
2008; Saunders & MacLeod, 2002). The misinformation paradigm (cf.
Loftus, Miller, & Burns, 1978), traditionally used to study misinformation
effects, involves participants initially viewing a target event (e.g., a car stopping at a yield sign) followed by a questionnaire that subtly includes some
misleading details about the event (e.g., a question asking about the car
stopped at a stop sign). On a later memory test, misinformed participants
choose the misinformation item (stop sign) instead of the original item (yield
sign), while nonmisinformed participants choose the original item.
To study the influence of retrieval-induced forgetting on misinformation
effects, Saunders and MacLeod (2002) combined the eyewitness retrievalpractice paradigm with the misinformation paradigm. In the eyewitness
retrieval-practice portion of the experiment, participants read narratives containing information about items stolen from two households, were questioned
about half of the items from one of the burgled households, and finally were
asked to recall all of the items from both households. Following the free-recall
phase, which demonstrated typical retrieval-induced forgetting effects, participants were asked questions about the initially read narratives. Within this
question set, one question contained misinformation about one of the three
item types (Rpþ, Rp, or Nrp). On a subsequent forced-choice recognition
test, participants were more likely to choose the misinformation item when it
had been introduced in reference to the Rp item. Misinformation introduced about practiced items (Rpþ items) or about items from the nonpracticed burglary (Nrp items) was chosen at a rate comparable to those made by
control participants who had received no retrieval practice for either burglary.
This finding suggests that retrieval-induced forgetting may present a risk factor
for memory distortion.
4.5 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
To understand the ramifications of retrieval-induced forgetting for memory of
real events, one must consider two important facts about the interrogation
of eyewitnesses: Questioning of eyewitnesses typically elicits incomplete recall
of the critical incident and thus sets the stage for retrieval-induced forgetting of
initially nonquestioned information, and eyewitnesses are often questioned
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repeatedly between the critical incident and when they appear in court. The
startling implication of the confluence of these two factors is that events
not recalled by an eyewitness during the first interrogation may be very difficult to recover later. That is, those details that are initially recalled will
continue to be recalled, while those details that are initially forgotten will
continue to suffer additional forgetting. By the time an eyewitness takes the
stand at trial, many details of the event may be lost. As such, one avenue
that future research should pursue to gain additional ecological validity is to
explore the consequences of selective retrieval in instances where eyewitnesses
are questioned repeatedly, by many interrogators, and across many days.
Another important direction for future research to consider is whether
retrieval-induced forgetting of offender characteristics alters lineup decision
accuracy. To date, the eyewitness retrieval-practice paradigm has limited
the final assessment of memory to free or cued recall of the type of information that was studied and practiced. Yet, one of the most crucial moments in
eyewitness testimony is when the witness selects a suspect from a lineup, and
lineup procedures are presently absent from the eyewitness retrieval-induced
forgetting literature. If a witness is questioned in depth about the details of the
offender’s face (e.g., by a sketch artist), does this partial retrieval alter that witness’s ability to accurately select the offender from a lineup? Does it alter the
confidence with which the witness makes a lineup selection? It seems like
these are among the most critical questions to be answered.
Ultimately, it may prove impossible to fully protect eyewitnesses from
retrieval-induced forgetting. By asking a particular question first, for example,
investigators may instantaneously act to bias subsequent recollections. Moreover, retrieval is not always externally induced. Eyewitnesses are likely to
repeatedly retrieve events on their own, and the way in which they do so
may be biased by their own personal expectations and prejudices. What the
results of the research reviewed here tell usdif not how to prevent
retrieval-induced forgetting in eyewitness contextsdis to better understand
how eyewitness contexts are influenced by retrieval-induced forgetting. In
this way, we may hopefully be better able to take such dynamics into account
when assessing how eyewitnesses recall the events they claim to remember.
5. RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING AND SOCIAL
COGNITION
Memory is likely to play an important role in a variety of social processes (e.g., the way in which we interact with others, the types of
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information we remember about others, and how we form and maintain
impressions and judgments about others). Thus, to fully understand the implications of retrieval-induced forgetting, we must understand the way in
which it has the potential to influence, as well as be influenced by, such processes. The particular information we remember about a given individual
might determine, for example, the way in which we feel about that person
or the way in which we interact with them. If retrieval-induced forgetting
systematically alters the nature of what is accessible, then it may systematically influence social behavior. Moreover, retrieval-induced forgetting
should not be studieddat least not exclusivelydin a vacuum. Although experiments are often run individually in cubicle lab spaces, cognition is also
instantiated socially, and social dynamics may influence how and when
retrieval-induced forgetting takes place.
5.1 Information about Other People
There is now robust evidence that information about others is susceptible to
retrieval-induced forgetting. In the first study to investigate this possibility,
Macrae and MacLeod (1999) exposed participants to 10 relatively positive
traits about each of two target individuals (e.g., “Bill is romantic and studious”; “John is artistic and generous”) and then provided participants with
retrieval practice for 5 of the traits about one of the individuals. As has
been shown in most other studies of retrieval-induced forgetting, this selective retrieval practice caused participants to forget the nonpracticed traits
associated with the practiced individual. For example, retrieving the fact
that Bill is romantic caused participants to forget that Bill is studious. Similar
effects have since been observed in a variety of social contexts (e.g., Brazel &
Ringqvist, 2009; Dunn & Spellman, 2003; Fernandes & Saunders, 2013;
García-Bajos & Migueles, 2009; Iglesias-Parro & Gomez-Ariza, 2006;
Lechuga, Gomez-Ariza, Iglesias-Parro, & Pelegrina, 2012; MacLeod &
Macrae, 2001; Storm & Jobe, 2012a; Storm, Bjork, & Bjork, 2005). It is
presently unclear whether certain types of social information are more susceptible to retrieval-induced forgetting than others, but some studies have
suggested that negative information may be more susceptible to forgetting
than positive information (e.g., Brazel & Ringqvist, 2009; Storm et al.,
2005).
5.2 Stereotypes and Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
In a classic study of retrieval-induced forgetting, Dunn and Spellman (2003)
exposed participants to stereotypic and individuating traits about
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hypothetical individuals of specific stereotyped groups. An Asian woman,
for example, was characterized as being “studious” and “wealthy” (where
“studious” was the stereotypic trait and “wealthy” was the individuating
trait), while a mother was characterized as being “patient” and “musical”
(where “patient” was the stereotypic trait and “musical” was the individuating trait). Retrieval practice for one type of information (i.e., stereotypical
or individuating) caused forgetting of the other type of information. At first
glance, this finding appears to suggest that adjusting the type of information
a person retrieves about someone has the potential to reduce or even eliminate the stereotypes they hold about that person. Unfortunately, as shown
in panel A of Figure 3, Dunn and Spellman also found that when stereotypical beliefs were strong, the traits associated with those beliefs were less susceptible to forgetting, perhaps because such beliefs were well integrated
within participants’ preexisting belief structures and social schemas.
In a later study, Quinn, Hugenberg, and Bodenhausen (2004) also found
that stereotypical information modulated the effects of retrieval practice.
Participants studied person–trait pairs (e.g., Susan-Confident) about two target
individuals and then performed retrieval practice for half of the traits associated
with one of the targets. The traits were either positive or negative and either
stereotypic or nonstereotypic of one of two categories (i.e., athletes or feminists). When participants studied person–trait pairs without any knowledge of
the stereotype that organized them, typical effects of retrieval-induced
Figure 3 Panel A shows recall performance for stereotypic information (z-scores) as a
function of stereotype beliefs (data from Dunn and Spellman, 2003). Panel B shows recall
performance (proportion of items recalled) for stereotypic information as a function of
whether or not participants were made aware of the stereotype (data from Quinn et al.,
2004). Results show that high belief or awareness of a stereotype can reduce the extent
to which stereotypic information suffers retrieval-induced forgetting.
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forgetting were observed for the stereotypic traits. When participants were
informed of the stereotype (e.g., “Susan is a feminist”), however, the stereotypic traits that were affectively and stereotypically consistent with the practiced traits were protected from retrieval-induced forgetting. In fact, as
shown in panel B of Figure 3, such traits actually exhibited significant
retrieval-induced facilitation. These results lend additional support to the
work of Dunn and Spellman (2003), suggesting that the stereotypes we
hold may systematically influence the particular information we retain, biasing
us toward remembering stereotypically consistent information and forgetting
stereotypically inconsistent information.
5.3 Social Judgments, Behaviors, and Decision-Making
Does retrieval-induced forgetting, by manipulating the specific information
that is accessible, have the power to influence our impressions, judgments,
and decisions? Research has shown that metacognitive judgments are often
influenced by how fluent or accessible certain information is in memory
(e.g., Koriat, 1995, 1998). Thus, if retrieval-induced forgetting causes the selective forgetting of either positive or negative information about another
person, for example, then perhaps judgments and decisions about that person would be influenced accordingly.
To investigate this possibility, Storm et al. (2005) had participants study
personality traits (Experiment 1a) or behavior descriptions (Experiment 2)
about four hypothetical individuals. Participants were shown pictures of
the individuals and told they would be given the opportunity to interact
with one of them later in the experiment, and that they should learn as
much about them as possible. Critically, half of the traits or behavior descriptions about each individual were neutral (e.g., “Dave is lucky”; “Dave rides
his bike to school”), whereas the other half were either positive (e.g., “Dave
is generous”; “Dave runs errands for his elderly aunt”) or negative (e.g.,
“Dave is selfish”; “Dave tells lies to impress people”). After studying the
items, participants received retrieval practice for the neutral traits, causing
the retrieval-induced forgetting of the nonpracticed positive or negative
traits. More importantly, however, when participants were asked to judge
the individuals’ likability, such judgments were not influenced by whether
the positive or negative information had been forgotten.
More recently, Brazel and Ringqvist (2009) found similar evidence using
negative information that was even more salient (e.g., “beating up their
kids”), showing that retrieval-induced forgetting failed to affect performance
on an implicit attitude test for the targets. It is not immediately clear why
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retrieval-induced forgetting failed to influence social judgments and implicit
attitudes, but one possibility is that abstract judgments and impressions are to
some degree distinct from our ability to retrieve certain information, even if
that information led to the formation of such judgments and impressions in
the first place (e.g., Klein, Loftus, & Kihlstrom, 1996; Klein, Loftus, & Plog,
1992). Moreover, judgments may often not be based on exhaustive attempts
to retrieve relevant information. Rather, they may be made more spontaneously and based on gist (e.g., Brainerd & Reyna, 1990; Hastie & Park, 1986),
which may make them less likely to be influenced by changes in accessibility
owing to retrieval-induced forgetting.
Interestingly, other work has suggested that retrieval-induced forgetting
can, at least under some conditions, influence social behavior and decisionmaking (Coman & Hirst, 2012; Coman, Coman, & Hirst, 2013; Fernandes
& Saunders, 2013; Iglesias-Parro & Gomez-Ariza, 2006; Iglesias-Parro,
G
omez-Ariza, & Arias, 2009; Lechuga, G
omez-Ariza, Iglesias-Parro, &
Pelegrina, 2012). Iglesias-Parro and Gomez-Ariza (2006), for example, presented participants with candidates for a telephone insurance sales job. Two
candidates were each described with three positive traits (e.g., “persuasive”)
and three irrelevant traits (e.g., “single”). Then, during retrieval practice,
participants were prompted to retrieve the irrelevant traits associated with
one of the candidates. Prior to the final cued-recall testdwhich would later
show evidence of retrieval-induced forgettingdparticipants were presented
with pictures of the two candidates and asked to pick the one best for the
job. Participants were most likely to select the candidate for whom the irrelevant traits had not been practiced, presumably because the positive traits
associated with the other candidate had been forgotten.
Subsequent work has replicated this effect while demonstrating important boundary conditions. Iglesias-Parro et al. (2009), for example, found
that rereading the irrelevant attributes (instead of retrieving them) of a given
candidate was insufficient to bias decision-making, suggesting that active
retrieval may be critical for the effect to be observed. More recently, in a
study comparing younger and older adults, Lechuga et al. (2012) found
that although both younger and older adults exhibited typical effects of
retrieval-induced forgetting, only younger adults were influenced by such
forgetting when making their decisions. One interpretation of this latter
finding is that older adults may be less likely than younger adults to draw
on details from memory when making decisions, perhaps because they
rely more heavily on heuristic-based information when making social decisions (e.g., Kim & Hasher, 2005).
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Taken together, these results suggest that retrieval-induced forgetting
can affect social judgments and decision-making, but perhaps only when
participants explicitly attempt to consider relevant information. Storm
et al. (2005), for example, may have failed to find a significant effect of
retrieval-induced forgetting on social judgments because participants were
unlikely to attempt to remember the traits or behaviors associated with an
individual when deciding whether or not they liked that individual. They
might have instead formed a general impression and then let that impression
guide their judgments. Had participants been asked to make judgments
directly related to the studied information, then a very different pattern
might have been observed.
5.4 Socially Shared Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
Thus far, we have focused on how retrieval-induced forgetting influences
the way individuals remember social information, but there is also evidence
that retrieval-induced forgetting itself can occur socially. For example, imagine that one person selectively retrieves a subset of information aloud from
memory, while another person listens. Not only does this retrieval practice
cause the remembering person to forget other nonretrieved information, it
can also cause the listener to forget the nonretrieved information, a phenomenon referred to as socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting.
In the first study to demonstrate socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting, Cuc et al. (2007) found that when a speaker recalled some information,
related but unrecalled information was more likely to be forgotten by the
listener, but only when the listener monitored the speaker’s retrieval for accuracy. The first two experiments utilized a procedure very similar to that
used in typical retrieval-induced forgetting studies, with retrieval practice
being constrained by cued prompts (e.g., Experiment 1: Category–exemplar
word pairs such as “Fruit: Ba___”; Experiment 2: Event-based stories, such
as “Walked to schooldpi___ up J___”). In Experiment 3, however,
retrieval practice was left more unconstrained such that the speaker and
listener took turns recalling, much in the same way that a conversation
would unfold. Socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting was observed in
all three experiments.
Socially shared retrieval-induced forgetting has now been observed
many times, in many contexts, and with many types of remembering
(Barber & Mather, 2012; Coman et al., 2013; Coman & Hirst, 2012;
Cuc, et al., 2007; Coman, Manier, & Hirst, 2009; Koppel, Wohl, Meksin,
& Hirst, 2014; Stone, Barnier, Sutton, & Hirst, 2013; for reviews, see Hirst
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& Echterhoff, 2012; Stone, Coman, Brown, Koppel, & Hirst, 2012). As this
body of work grows, it has become increasingly clear that understanding the
way in which people remember and forget requires more than a consideration of the individual, but a consideration of social context as well. For
example, studies have shown that people are less susceptible to socially
shared retrieval-induced forgetting when they listen to an expert than
when they listen to a nonexpert (Koppel et al., 2014), or when they listen
to someone of the opposite sex than when they listen to someone of the
same sex (Barber & Mather, 2012), presumably because such factors determine the extent to which listeners monitor and co-retrieve with other
individuals.
5.5 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
Although the beliefs, judgments, and perceptions we make about others may
not be tied directly to the accessibility of our memories, such processes
would seem highly unlikely to function in a way that is completely independent from our memories. The particular information we remember (and
forget) may help shape our social representations, allowing us to flexibly
and adaptively update our judgments and perceptions over time. Whether
and how retrieval-induced forgetting plays a role in this context remains
to be seen. Something researchers should keep in mind, however, is that
retrieval in real-world settings is much less constrained than the type of
retrieval-practice tasks employed in the laboratory. What we think about
and try to remember is determined not by the whims of an experimenter,
but by our motivations, desires, and prejudices. Thus, the power of
retrieval-induced forgetting to affect our judgments and perceptions may
be determined to a large extent by our existing judgments and perceptions.
An important implication of this consideration is that developing a more
complete understanding of the way in which retrieval-induced forgetting
influences social cognition will necessarily require a more complete understanding of the way in which social cognition influences retrieval-induced
forgetting.
6. RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING AND
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MEMORY
Autobiographical memory has been argued to serve a number of functions, ranging from directive and social functions to those that have to do
with how we represent ourselves and cope with adversity (Conway,
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2005; Williams, Conway, & Cohen, 2008). Conway and Pleydell-Pearce
(2000) model suggests that autobiographical memory is comprised of two
key components: the working self and the autobiographical knowledge base.
The working self includes an individual’s personal goals, while the autobiographical knowledge base contains memories of prior events and other
episodic information accrued across the life span. The working self is presumed to activate certain information from the autobiographical knowledge
base to satisfy its goals. Knowledge that is threatening or inconsistent with
the self can be inhibited, for example, while knowledge that is comforting
and consistent with the self can be maintained and consistently retrieved.
If retrieval-induced forgetting plays a role in selectively facilitating, impairing, and shaping self-relevant memories, then clearly it would have important implications for understanding autobiographical memory.
6.1 Self-Relevant Memories
Is retrieval-induced forgetting observed with the type of complex semantic
and episodic information associated with autobiographical memory? On the
one hand, there are good reasons to think that autobiographical memories
might be protected from retrieval-induced forgetting. Memories for
personal experiences are self-relevant, often emotionally significant, and
can be retrieved in response to a number of retrieval cues. Each of these factors may protect autobiographical memories from forgetting. Macrae and
Roseveare (2002), for example, found that when participants imagined purchasing a number of items as gifts, retrieval practice for some of the items
failed to cause the forgetting of other items. This protection was not
observed, however, when participants imagined their best friend or a
stranger purchasing the items as gifts. Macrae and Roseveare argued that
self-relevance may offer protection from retrieval-induced forgetting
through distinctive processing (see, e.g., Smith & Hunt, 2000). That is,
self-relevant information may be encoded in such a way that makes it easily
distinguishable from, and therefore not in competition with, other information in memory.
In contrast to the findings of Macrae and Roseveare (2002), later research
has shown that autobiographical memories can and do suffer from retrievalinduced forgetting (e.g., Barnier et al., 2004; Harris, Sharman, Barnier, &
Moulds, 2010; Hauer & Wessel, 2006; Jobe, 2012; Stone, Luminet, & Hirst,
2013; Stone, Barnier, et al., 2013; Stone, Luminet, et al., 2013). Barnier
et al., for example, asked participants to generate autobiographical memories
associated with positive, negative, and neutral category cues. Participants
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were then guided to retrieve a subset of the memories associated with a
subset of the cues, further elaborating on the memories as they did.
This retrieval practice caused participants to forgetdrelative to baseline
memoriesdthe nonpracticed memories associated with the practiced categories, a forgetting effect that was observed for all types of autobiographical
memories regardless of valence.
Interestingly, Hauer and Wessel (2006) conducted a similar study but
found that whereas negative memories were susceptible to retrievalinduced forgetting, positive memories were not (see also, Harris et al.,
2010). These results might be interpreted as suggesting that negative autobiographical memories are more susceptible to retrieval-induced forgetting
than positive autobiographical memories, but such a finding has not been
consistently observed across the literature. In any case, taken collectively,
these and other studies suggest that self-relevant autobiographical memories
are indeed susceptible to retrieval-induced forgetting, and that negative
memories are no more protected from forgetting than are positive
memories.
6.2 Individual Differences in Autobiographical Memory
In real-world contexts, the types of memories an individual retrieves are
determined not by an experimenter, but by some combination of the
cues that are available and the individual’s particular motivation and biases
influenced by the working self. Although both positive and negative autobiographical memories may be susceptible to retrieval-induced forgetting, it
is possible that in the natural functioning of autobiographical memory, negative memories may be more likely to be deemed unwanted or to-beavoided, and thus more likely to be targeted by inhibition. In this way,
retrieval-induced forgetting may help prevent unsettling, threatening, or
even traumatic memories from reaching consciousness.
Storm and Jobe (2012b) explored this possibility by providing participants with a series of memory probes, such as “pool” and “medicine”
(e.g., Crovitz & Shiffman, 1974), and asking them to recall either positive
or negative events associated with the cues from their autobiographical
past. Participants in the positive condition attempted to recall memories
that made them “happy, proud, pleased, or gratified,” whereas participants
in the negative condition attempted to recall memories that made them
“sad, embarrassed, depressed, or hurt.” Storm and Jobe predicted that if
retrieval-induced forgetting functions to keep negative autobiographical
memories from coming to mind, then individual differences in forgetting
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should correlate with the rate at which various types of autobiographical
memories are recalled. To test this hypothesis, retrieval-induced forgetting
was assessed using the typical retrieval-practice paradigm and then correlated
with performance on the separate memory-probe task. As predicted, participants who exhibited higher levels of retrieval-induced forgetting recalled
significantly fewer negative memories than participants who exhibited lower
levels of retrieval-induced forgetting.
In a second experiment, Storm and Jobe (2012b) employed the same
basic paradigm but asked participants to recall negative episodic memories
from either childhood or the past month. A similar pattern was observed
such that participants who exhibited low levels of retrieval-induced forgetting were more likely to recall negative events (from both contexts) than
were participants who exhibited high levels of retrieval-induced forgetting.
This correlation was observed even when limiting the sample to participants
who were not depressed (scores of 13 or below on the BDI-II; Beck, Steer,
& Brown, 1996), which is important given evidence that negative moods
have the potential to reduce retrieval-induced forgetting (e.g., B€auml &
Kuhbandner, 2007). The scatterplot presented in panel A of Figure 4 shows
the relationship between retrieval-induced forgetting and negative autobiographical recall collapsed across the two experiments.
Although speculative, given the results of Storm and Jobe (2012b), one
might wonder if retrieval-induced forgetting is at least partially responsible
Figure 4 Panel A shows recall performance for negative autobiographical memories as
a function of individual differences in retrieval-induced forgetting across Experiments 1
and 2 in Storm and Jobe (2012b), r ¼ 0.32, p < 0.001. Panel B shows recall performance for positive and negative autobiographical memories in Experiment 1 by individuals who exhibited the least amount of retrieval-induced forgetting vs individuals
who exhibited average to high amounts of retrieval-induced forgetting. Data from
Storm and Jobe (2012b).
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for the positivity bias often observed in autobiographical memory (Bersten,
1996; Waldfogel, 1948; Walker, Showronski, & Thompson, 2003). Indeed,
as shown in panel B of Figure 4, participants who exhibited average to high
amounts of retrieval-induced forgetting exhibited normal positivity biases,
whereas participants who exhibited low amounts of retrieval-induced
forgetting failed to exhibit any positivity bias. We encounter retrieval cues
all the time, and perhaps the inhibition underlying retrieval-induced forgetting helps keep negative memories associated with those retrieval cues from
being consciously retrieved. Over time, this bias in retrieval practice may update the relative strength of positive and negative memories to make the
former more accessible than the latter, a possibility that future research
should explore.
6.3 Retrieval-Induced Forgetting and Depression
If retrieval-induced forgetting can function to keep negative memories from
being retrieved, thus maintaining a positivity bias in autobiographical memory, then one might wonder if deficits in forgetting might be associated with
symptoms such as anxiety, persistent sadness, intrusive negative thoughts,
and rumination, each of which is associated with clinical depression
(Nolen-Hoeksema, 2000; Watkins & Moulds, 2005). In fact, research has
observed significant relationships between reductions in retrieval-induced
forgetting and posttraumatic stress disorder (Amir, Badour, & Freese,
2009), anxiety (Law, Groome, Thorn, Potts, & Cuchanan, 2012; Saunders,
2012), and social phobia (Amir, Coles, Brigidi, & Foa; 2001), particularly
when retrieval-induced forgetting is measured using the types of materials
that individuals find distressing.
If a deficit in one’s susceptibility to retrieval-induced forgetting can lead
to negativity biases in autobiographical memory, and to an increased propensity for experiencing anxiety and intrusive memories, then perhaps
such a deficit stands as a significant risk factor for depression. In support of
this hypothesis, correlations between retrieval-induced forgetting and
depression have been observed. Groome and Sterkaj (2010), for example,
found that 21 individuals diagnosed with clinical depression exhibited significantly less retrieval-induced forgetting than 21 control participants who
were not clinically depressed. Similarly, in the study by Storm and Jobe
(2012b), when data from participants suffering at least mild levels of depression were analyzed (i.e., scores of 14 or higher on the BDI-II; Beck et al.,
1996), a significant correlation was observed such that individuals exhibiting
the least retrieval-induced forgetting were significantly more depressed
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(as measured by severity on the BDI-II) than were individuals exhibiting the
most retrieval-induced forgetting.
It is tempting to conclude that individual differences in susceptibility to
retrieval-induced forgetting lead to individual differences in susceptibility to
depression, perhaps mediated in part by the way in which forgetting affects
autobiographical memory. However, strong evidence supporting this sort of
causal relationship remains lacking. An alternative explanation might be that
depression leads to changes and impairments in memory (e.g., Sternberg &
Jarvik, 1976; Warren & Groome, 1984; Williams, 1996), which are then
observed in the reduced levels of retrieval-induced forgetting. Several findings seem to support this alternative hypothesis. For example, retrievalinduced forgetting is significantly diminished when individuals not suffering
from depression are placed in a negative mood (e.g., B€auml & Kuhbandner,
2007) or under high amounts of stress (Koessler, Engler, Riether, & Kissler,
2009). Of course, it is possible that deficits in retrieval-induced forgetting
and depression contribute to each other, leading to a cycle of negative
remembering and negative feelings that continuously feed each other.
6.4 Remembering and Forgetting Trauma
There is evidence that individuals can experience serious trauma or abuse
and then report an extensive period of time in which they do not remember
it. Although such experiences clearly do occur, much less clear is how to
interpret them (see, e.g., Anderson, 2001; Anderson & Huddleston, 2012;
Briere & Conte, 1993; Freyd, 1996; Geraerts et al., 2007; Loftus & Davis,
2006; McNally & Geraerts, 2009; McNally, 2003; Schooler, Bendiksen,
& Ambadar, 1997). We know that some recovered memories are likely to
reflect memory constructions, particularly when memories have been
recovered in the context of hypnosis, guided imagery, or related therapybased procedures (e.g., Ceci & Loftus, 1994). There are instances, however,
in which genuine traumatic experiences appear to be forgotten for an
extended period of time and then later recovered.
One relevant piece of evidence in this contentious area of research is that
the likelihood of forgetting traumatic childhood abuse varies as a function of
the nature of the trauma. Victims are more likely to forget or have memory
problems associated with trauma, such as childhood sexual abuse, when the
perpetrator is a caregiver or member of the victim’s family than when the
perpetrator is not (e.g., DePrince & Freyd, 2004; DePrince et al., 2012;
Epstein & Bottoms, 2002; Freyd, 1996, 1999; Freyd, DePrince, &
Zurbriggen, 2001). According to betrayal trauma theory (Freyd, 1996),
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victims may experience memory problems in part because of the need to
maintain attachment to someone who is important for their survival and
development. Anderson (2001) has argued that retrieval-induced forgetting
may play an important role in the forgetting associated with betrayal trauma.
Because victims of child abuse are often forced to continue living with their
abuser, they may have no means of escaping the cues that prompt memories
of the abuse. And because victims often need to preserve attachment with
their abuser and sustain their own emotional well-being, they may selectively retrieve nontraumatic memories in order to avoid the more threatening memories. Over time, this selective retrieval practice may render
memories of abuse and trauma less accessible. The dynamics would be
very different in cases where victims are abused by strangers. Although there
would still be a strong motivation to not think about the trauma, there
would not be the repeated exposure to triggering cues or the need to maintain attachment with the abuser.
6.5 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
One of the most underappreciated and poorly understood peculiarities of
human memory is that remembering and forgettingdthough widely
regarded as distinct, opposing processesdare fundamentally interdependent
(Bjork, 2011). This interdependency arises due to a curious asymmetry:
Although humans have an astonishing capacity to store a virtually limitless
amount of knowledge, the capacity to retrieve such information is severely
limited (Bjork & Bjork, 1992). Although our limited capacity to retrieve
may seem to reflect a failure of memory, it may be essential for updating
memory over time, especially in the context of autobiographical memory.
Retrieval-induced forgetting may act as a sort of memory modifier or
updater, allowing outdated, unwanted, and irrelevant information to be
set aside and thus facilitate the learning and remembering of new, desired,
and relevant information.
Our ability to ensure a positivity bias in autobiographical memory, to keep
unwanted or intrusive memories at bay, and to maintain a healthy and adaptive self-image, may depend, at least in part, on our ability to selectively forget.
This is one of many reasons that recent investigations into individuals with
highly superior autobiographical memory are so interesting (e.g., LePort
et al., 2012; Parker, Cahill, & McGaugh, 2006). Such individuals appear to
maintain extraordinary access to events and experiences from their past, an
ability that is often characterized by them as both a blessing and a curse. It
would be interesting to explore whether differences in retrieval-induced
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forgetting (and inhibitory functioning more generally) play a role in this and
other autobiographical memory phenomena.
7. RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING AND CREATIVE
COGNITION
Although retrieval-induced forgetting may have negative implications
for the recall of the particular information being forgotten, it may have far
more positive implications for the general functioning of cognition by
enabling our ability to overcome interference and avoid perseverating on
contextually inappropriate, prepotent responses (Anderson, 2003; Storm
& Levy, 2012; Storm, 2011). Indeed, the inhibition underlying retrievalinduced forgetting may have the potential to facilitate performance on
any cognitive task that requires one to select or generate a target response
in the face of competition from other, nontarget responses. This adaptive
form of forgetting may be particularly important for overcoming mental fixation. Steve Smith and colleagues have shown that our ability to think of
new ideas and generate solutions to problems is often severely limited by
the persistent accessibility of nontarget ideas and solutions, a phenomenon
referred to as mental fixation (for reviews, see Smith, 2003, 2008; Smith
& Ward, 2012). If retrieval-induced forgetting can help us to overcome fixation, then such a finding would suggest that it may significantly impact our
ability to think, solve problems, and generate creative ideas.
In the retrieval-practice paradigm, the studied items are presumed to cause
fixation during retrieval practice by interfering with access to the target items
(e.g., Raaijmakers & Shiffrin, 1981; Rundus, 1973; Watkins & Watkins,
1975). In the context of creative cognition, old ideas and unhelpful representations are presumed to cause fixation by constraining thinking and preventing
access to new ideas and new ways of thinking (e.g., Duncker, 1945; Luchins &
Luchins, 1959; Maier, 1931; Smith & Blankenship, 1989, 1991; Smith, Ward,
& Schumacher, 1993). In both contexts, inhibition may serve as a mechanism
by which to overcome fixation, thus facilitating our ability to perform a broad
array of cognitive tasks, such as remembering, thinking, and problem solving.
Indeed, this framework would seem to predict that just as remembering causes
forgetting, so should the more general act of thinking.
7.1 A Predictor of the Ability to Overcome Fixation
The inhibitory account of retrieval-induced forgetting assumes that forgetting is the consequence of a goal-directed mechanism that functions to
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reduce interference, or mental fixation, during retrieval practice. If so, then
it stands to reason that individuals who exhibit greater amounts of retrievalinduced forgetting should perform better on tasks that require interference
or fixation to be overcome. Storm and Angello (2010) tested this hypothesis
by examining the relationship between retrieval-induced forgetting and performance on a creative problem-solving taskdspecifically, the Remote
Associates Test (RAT; Mednick, 1962). Their hypothesis was that if
retrieval-induced forgetting reflects the ability to overcome fixation, then
individuals who exhibit greater levels of retrieval-induced forgetting should
also perform better on the RAT, but only under conditions of increased
fixation.
Storm and Angello (2010) first measured individual differences in
retrieval-induced forgetting using a semantic-generation version of the
retrieval-practice paradigm (e.g., B€auml, 2002; Storm et al., 2006). Then,
in a separate phase of the experiment, participants attempted to solve 20
RAT problems. In the RAT, participants must generate a fourth word
that is related to three cue words. The fourth word can be semantically
related, form a common phrase, or be a synonym to each of the three cue
words. For example, if lick, sprinkle, and mines are cue words for a given
problem, then the correct solution would be salt, which forms the phrases
salt lick and salt mines, and is closely related to sprinkle (salt is sprinkled on
food). Critically, before attempting to solve the RAT problems, half of
the participants studied cue–response pairs consisting of cues from the
RAT problems and misleading associate responses that would not serve as
viable solutions, thus inducing mental fixation (Smith & Blankenship,
1991). For example, participants studied lick–tongue, sprinkle–rain, and
mines–rock, which would then increase the accessibility of the nontarget associates and impair participants’ ability to solve the RAT problems. The
other half of the participants did not study these cue–response pairs (baseline
condition), and thus would not suffer the same degree of fixation.
Prior work has shown that participants perform significantly worse in the
fixation condition than in the baseline condition (Smith & Blankenship,
1991). The prediction made by Storm and Angello (2010), however, was
that participants exhibiting higher levels of retrieval-induced forgetting
would be better able to resolve fixationdand that is precisely what was
observed. The extent to which participants suffered fixation was significantly
predicted by individual differences in retrieval-induced forgetting. To illustrate, Storm and Angello split participants into two groups, those exhibiting
low levels of retrieval-induced forgetting and those exhibiting high levels of
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retrieval-induced forgetting. Participants exhibiting high levels of retrievalinduced forgetting were able to solve 93% of the problems in the fixation
condition that were solved in the baseline condition, whereas participants
exhibiting low levels of retrieval-induced forgetting were able to solve
only 47% of the problems in the fixation condition that were solved in
the baseline condition.
Koppel and Storm (2014) replicated and extended the work of Storm
and Angello (2010) by examining whether an incubation period (i.e., a
break) following an initial problem-solving attempt would alter the relationship between problem-solving performance and retrieval-induced forgetting. Incubation periods have been shown to reduce fixation (Smith &
Blankenship, 1989, 1991). Thus, in the current context, the incubation
period should make inhibition less important for overcoming fixation, and
thus reduce the correlation between retrieval-induced forgetting and
problem-solving success. To investigate this possibility, Koppel and Storm
had participants attempt to solve 20 RAT problems for 60 s each. Half of
the participants attempted to solve the problems for 60 consecutive seconds
(continuous condition), whereas the other half attempted to solve the problems in two 30-s blocks separated by a 12-min break (distributed condition).
Fixation was induced for all participants by having them study misleading
cue–response pairs prior to problem solving. Replicating the earlier work,
Koppel and Storm found that retrieval-induced forgetting correlated significantly with better performance during the initial 30 s of the problem solving
(in both conditions). This correlation persisted in the final 30 s of the continuous condition, but was eliminated in the final 30 s of the distributed condition. Presumably, the incubation period provided in the distributed
condition allowed fixation to dissipate on its own, thus obviating the role
for the inhibition underlying retrieval-induced forgetting.
7.2 Problem-Solving-Induced Forgetting
If the inhibition underlying retrieval-induced forgetting does facilitate
problem-solving performance by helping participants overcome fixation,
then associates causing fixation should be susceptible to problem-solvinginduced forgetting. Storm, Angello, and Bjork (2011) investigated this possibility by testing forgetting of misleading associates following RAT problem
solving. Prior to solving a series of RAT problems, participants were
exposed to a number of cue–response pairs (e.g., lick–tongue, sprinkle–rain,
mines–rock, manners–polite, tennis–ball, and round–square). Critically, only
half of the pairs contained misleading associates designed to cause fixation.
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That is, half of the pairs consisted of cue words that would later be used
to form the RAT problems (i.e., lick, sprinkle, mines), whereas half did not
(i.e., manners, tennis, round). After attempting to solve the RAT problems,
participants received a surprise final test for all of the cue–response pairs
they had initially studied. As predicted, participants recalled fewer responses
associated with cues encountered during problem solving than responses
associated with cues that were not encountered during problem solving,
thus demonstrating problem-solving-induced forgetting.
Storm et al. (2011) posited that the misleading associates were inhibited
because they caused mental fixation, similarly to how exemplars are presumably inhibited during retrieval practice because they cause interference.
In both situations, unwanted responses that have the potential to impede
performance become less accessible in the future than they would have
been otherwise. In subsequent experiments, Storm et al. showed that
problem-solving-induced forgetting was observed even when participants
failed to generate solutions during problem solving, and that the forgetting
effect increased when participants spent more time attempting to solve
the problems. Additionally, individuals who exhibited greater levels of
problem-solving-induced forgetting performed better on a separate set
of RAT problems than did individuals who exhibited reduced levels of
problem-solving-induced forgetting. Interestingly, Storm and Koppel
(2012) failed to find evidence of cue independence in problem-solvinginduced forgettingda finding that appears to set it apart from retrievalinduced forgetting.
7.3 Thinking-Induced Forgetting
If forgetting is a general consequence of thinking and solving problems, then
it should not be limited to the context of RAT problems. To examine this
possibility, Storm and Patel (2014) administered a modified version of the
Alternative Uses Task (Guilford, 1967) in which participants attempted to
think of uses for common household objects. In their paradigm, illustrated
in panel A of Figure 5, participants studied four common uses associated
with each of eight objects. For half of the objects, participants simply studied
the uses and then went on to the next trial (baseline condition). For the
other half of the objects, participants studied the uses before attempting to
generate new uses for those objects (thinking condition). Across several conditions and experiments, and as shown in the left hand bars of panel B,
participants reliably recalled fewer studied items in the thinking condition
than in the baseline condition, a phenomenon they referred to as
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Figure 5 Panel A shows a schematic of the basic paradigm used by Storm and Patel to
demonstrate thinking-induced forgetting. Panel B shows the results of Experiments 2a
and 2b as a function of whether they used the studied uses as hints to guide their generation of new uses. Error bars represent standard errors of the mean. Panel B is adapted
from Storm and Patel (2014).
thinking-induced forgetting. Interestingly, a significant correlation
was observed such that thinking-induced forgetting predicted the number of
creative uses that participants were able to generate. That is, just as problemsolving-induced forgetting predicted the ability to solve problemsd
thinking-induced forgetting predicted the ability to generate creative ideas.
More recent work has shown that even our own ideas are susceptible to
thinking-induced forgetting (Ditta & Storm, 2014). Specifically, participants were asked to think of four uses for an object before thinking of additional uses. Thinking of the additional uses caused participants to forget the
initial uses they had generated, an effect that was observed even when participants were highly motivated to remember their initial uses. The only
condition in which thinking-induced forgetting has not been observed is
when participants are explicitly instructed to use either the studied uses
(Storm & Patel, 2014; see the right hand bars of panel B in Figure 5) or
the initially generated uses (Ditta & Storm, 2014) as hints to help them
think of new uses. It is possible that forgetting is not observed under these
conditions because both studied uses and initially generated uses do not
cause fixation. That is, if ideas can serve as cues to mediate the generation
of new ideas, then there should be no need to inhibit them. As reviewed
earlier in this chapter, similar protective effects of interitem integration
have been observed across the retrieval-induced forgetting literature
(e.g., Anderson, Green, & McChulloch, 2000; Chan et al., 2006;
Goodmon & Anderson, 2011).
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7.4 Concluding Comments and Future Directions
Retrieval-induced forgetting, problem-solving-induced forgetting, and
thinking-induced forgetting appear to share similar features, and they all
seem to result, at least in part, from a mechanism acting to overcome fixation. It is important to emphasize, however, that each of these phenomena is
likely to be multiply determined, and the extent to which different mechanisms account for the different phenomena is likely to vary as a function
of factors such as context, the nature of the task, strategies, and individual
differences. Although we have focused on inhibition as the explanatory
mechanism, forgetting can also be caused by factors such as strength-based
interference and context change. For example, generating new uses for an
object might cause those uses to block access to the earlier-studied uses.
Moreover, thinking of new uses may change the way in which an object
is represented in memory, making the object a less effective cue for the recall
of the originally studied uses. There is no reason to think that inhibition is
the only mechanism underlying these phenomena, and future research
should try to delineate the various mechanisms that contribute to the forgetting effects that have been observed.
Finally, some readers may be surprised that inhibition has the potential to
facilitate creative thinking, especially because inhibition is more typically
associated with reduced creative thinking (e.g., Carson, Peterson, & Higgins,
2003; Eysenck, 1995; Martindale, 1999). It seems to us that the relationship
between inhibition and creative cognition is likely to be quite nuanced. Inhibition may stand to impair creativity when one inhibits information that
might be novel or useful, but inhibition may stand to benefit creativity
when one inhibits information that causes fixation and interferes with access
to information that is novel and useful. These costs and benefits are likely to
differ as a function of a number of factors, such as the nature of the particular
task, but presumably the benefits should be greatest under conditions of fixation. If creativity is not contingent upon overcoming strong, irrelevant information in memory, and often it is not, then the role for inhibition and
forgetting may be substantially diminished.
8. BROAD CONSIDERATIONS FOR THE STUDY OF
RETRIEVAL-INDUCED FORGETTING IN CONTEXT
Albert Einstein (1933) once said: “It can scarcely be denied that the
supreme goal of all theory is to make the irreducible basic elements as simple
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and as few as possible without having to surrender the adequate representation of a single datum of experience.” This quote, sometimes referred to as
Einstein’s razor (in contrast to Occam’s razor), contends that a theory should
be made as simple as possible, but no simpler. Of course, whether a theory
adequately represents every datum of experience depends not only on the
soundness of the theory, but on the scope of the data collected to test it.
As researchers, we tend to create paradigms to measure phenomena and
then repeatedly mine those paradigms to develop theories. Implicitly
assumed is that such theories will generalize beyond the paradigms, and in
many cases they do. The danger arises when we become so enamored by
a paradigm that we end up studying it as the target of interest, instead of
the psychology it was created to tap into. Of course, using established and
well-mined paradigms is important for a number of reasons, particularly
with regard to experimental control and comparability between studies,
but the unfortunate side effect is that we often limit our theories to explaining only a small slice of reality (for relevant discussions, see, e.g., Glenberg,
1997; Hintzman, 2011; Neisser, 1976; Watkins, 1990).
The goal of the present chapter was to highlight several attempts to move
beyond the typical retrieval-practice paradigm to explore retrieval-induced
forgetting in context. We believe that developing a comprehensive understanding of retrieval-induced forgetting requires a more thorough consideration of how it functions in real-world settings, and how it interacts with
other psychological processes. Doing so may uncover new assumptions
and new boundary conditions, and reshape the questions that need to be
asked. Ultimately, most researchers are interested in retrieval-induced
forgetting not because they want to know how and why retrieving one category exemplar causes the forgetting of another category exemplar in the
context of a 25-min laboratory experience. Rather, they are interested in
it because it has the potential to inform our basic understanding of how
and why we remember and forget, and the role of such processes within
the broad array of human experience.
The lines of work reviewed in the present chapter are still in their infancy. There are many questions that have yet to be answered and many
more that have yet to be asked. On the basis of the evidence we have so
far, however, several general observations deserve emphasis. First,
retrieval-induced forgetting appears to be a decidedly robust and general
phenomenon. With few exceptions, it has been observed in just about every
context in which it has been exploreddfrom educational settings, to
eyewitness memory, to memory about oneself, and others. An important
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limitation of this observation, however, is that the majority of the research
that has observed retrieval-induced forgetting in these contexts has
employed paradigms deviating only slightly or superficially from the typical
retrieval-practice paradigm. Nevertheless, if these findings are taken at face
value, retrieval-induced forgetting appears to impact basic cognitive and
psychological processes. For example, retrieval-induced forgetting has
been shown to predict one’s ability to solve problems, think of creative ideas,
and remember relatively more positive than negative autobiographical
memories, and it has been shown to impact the way in which we learn, provide testimony, and make decisions. In all certainty, the existing literature
has only scratched the surface in terms of identifying such connections,
and substantial work will be needed to more fully understand the connections that have been identified.
Some theoretical assumptions came up repeatedly across the chapter.
Interitem integration, for example, which has been argued to reduce
competition and thus diminish a nonpracticed item’s susceptibility to
retrieval-induced forgetting (e.g., Anderson, Green, et al., 2000; Goodmon
& Anderson, 2011), was showndor at least argueddto prevent forgetting
in each of the five contexts we reviewed. Studying information in the
form of coherent prose, using initial ideas as hints to guide the generation
of new ideas, having expertise, or holding preexisting schemas and stereotypes, for example, were all shown to limit the extent to which retrievalinduced forgetting was observed. The generality of this effect suggests that
integration will be an important factor for future researchers to consider
in other contexts as well.
One factor that we believe should also be considered, even though it has
not been the focus of much of the research covered in the present chapter, is
that of cue independence. Cue independence reflects the finding that
retrieval-induced forgetting is observed not only when nonpracticed items
are tested via the same cues, but when tested via independent cues (e.g.,
Anderson & Spellman, 1995; Johnson & Anderson, 2004; Weller et al.,
2013; but see, e.g., Camp, Pecher, & Schmidt, 2007; Perfect et al., 2004).
The property of cue independence has been cited as strong evidence against
noninhibitory accounts of retrieval-induced forgetting and as providing support for instantiations of inhibitory accounts that argue that inhibition affects
items at the level of their representations. The importance and implications
of cue independence may take a very different form, however, when
considered beyond such theoretical distinctions and, more generally, beyond
the confines of the typical retrieval-practice paradigm.
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
183
Consider, for example, the context of autobiographical memory. One of
the hallmarks of memorydand especially autobiographical memorydis the
extent to which recall depends on the specific cues and contexts that are
available (see, e.g., Barclay, Bransford, Franks, McCarrell, & Nitsch, 1974;
Marian & Neisser, 2000; Smith & Moynan, 2008; Tulving & Thomson,
1973). Memories can go months if not years without being retrieved until
just the right constellation of cues is encountered. Although speculative,
one might contend that cue-specific forgetting would function more adaptively than cue-independent forgetting by shaping and updating autobiographical memory over time. Cue-specific forgetting would presumably
render nonpracticed and unwanted memories less accessible in response to
the cues that elicited them, while retaining the accessibility of such memories in other contexts and in response to other cues for which they would
be desired and appropriate (for similar arguments about transfer-appropriate
forgetting, see Perfect et al., 2004). Similar arguments can be made in other
contexts. Information that causes fixation while solving one problem, for
example, might remain useful for solving another problem, and a fact that
is irrelevant to one test question might be very relevant to another test question. Cue-specific forgetting could act to resolve interference while simultaneously reshaping associative connections, thus preparing us to think
and remember more effectively in the future. Note that this argument
does not negate the importance or validity of cue-independent effects of
retrieval-induced forgetting. Initial effects might be cue-independent but
then cascade into cue-specific effects by biasing subsequent rehearsal and
how information in long-term memory is integrated. The point is that
whether a given real-world effect of retrieval-induced forgetting is cue independent or cue dependent should be investigated, though not necessarily
for the purpose of distinguishing inhibitory and noninhibitory forms of
forgetting.
A related question is whether and for how long effects of retrievalinduced forgetting persist. To date, the majority of research has examined
this question in a very similarly constrained way. Specifically, participants
study some information, receive a few short retrieval-practice attempts for
a subset of that information, and are then tested after a few minutes, 24 h,
or 1 week. Evidence has been mixed (e.g., Chan, 2009; MacLeod & Macrae,
2001; Storm et al., 2012; for a meta-analysis, see Murayama et al., 2014), but
in the sense of trying to apply work on retrieval-induced forgetting to contexts beyond the retrieval-practice paradigm, the debate may be missing the
point. In real-world contexts, retrieval practice is often far more extensive
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than a few brief experimenter-cued trials, short-term effects can propagate to
long-term effects, items are reencountered, new information is learned, and
contexts are changed. To understand retrieval-induced forgetting in the
context of the retrieval-practice paradigm, these factors need to be
controlled. To understand the long-term influences of retrieval-induced
forgetting in real-world settings, however, these factors need to be taken
into account and investigated, something researchers have yet to do.
Finally, it deserves emphasis that retrieval-induced forgetting does not
need to be the consequence of inhibition to have important implications
for applied contexts and for informing our understanding of other psychological processes. If fixating information, painful autobiographical memories,
educational materials, or details of a witnessed crime are forgotten as a result
of retrieving certain information, for example, then such findings are important regardless of the underlying mechanisms. Obviously, understanding
how and why forgetting occurs is important, but there can be a temptation
to think that a finding is only interpretable if it can be directly connected to
the theoretical accounts derived from more basic work in the laboratory. We
would argue, however, that taking this perspective can be limiting, as the
assumptions and methodological considerations relevant to making these
sorts of theoretical distinctions often stand in contrast to obtaining the
ecological validity necessary for meaningful and generalizable application.
Of course, attempts to employ the types of experimental controls
needed to allow for interpretation within the context of existing theories
should not be thrown to the wind; rather, studies should be designed with
specific aims in mind. For example, the inhibition versus interference
debate is directly relevant to many of the findings reviewed here. Research
showing that individual differences in retrieval-induced forgetting are
correlated with the ability to overcome fixation (Storm & Angello,
2010), for example, makes sense if forgetting is assumed to be the result
of a goal-directed inhibitory process for overcoming competition; it
does not make sense if forgetting is assumed to be the result of interference
at test. Had Storm and Angello employed a methodology that measured
retrieval-induced forgetting differently, such as in a way that failed to control for interference at test (see, e.g., Anderson & Levy, 2007; Murayama
et al., 2014; Schilling, Storm, & Anderson, 2014; Soriano, Jiménez,
Roman, & Bajo, 2009), a different set of results would have likely been
observed, and thus a different conclusion would have been made.
Research has shown that retrieval-induced forgetting is likely to be a
multifarious phenomenon driven by different mechanisms depending on
A Review of Retrieval-Induced Forgetting
185
the particular way in which it is observed. Although we encourage
researchers to move beyond the typical retrieval-practice paradigm, they
should do so in a way that does not ignore the many important lessons
that have been learned using that paradigm.
9. CONCLUSION
The present chapter has provided a brief review of five areas of
research that have attempted to study retrieval-induced forgetting in
context. Although we readily admit that the existing literature remains
lacking, strides have been made, and we are hopeful that researchers
will continue to advance these and other lines of work in new and interesting ways. In doing so, we believe the theoretical functions and
dynamics of retrieval-induced forgetting will become more apparent.
Rather than studying retrieval-induced forgetting as a specific phenomenon observed using a specific paradigm, we should study retrieval-induced
forgetting as a family of phenomena impacting the ways in which we
think and remember across a multitude of contexts. The prospect of undertaking this much broader form of empirical exploration and theoretical
consideration may seem daunting, but will be ultimately necessary to
more fully delineate the true nature and impact of retrieval-induced
forgetting.
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