Explanations for Forgetting- Interference

Retroactive Interference- Muller 

Gave p's a list of nonsense syllables to learn for 6 minutes and then, after a retention interval, asked them to list the words. Their recall was not as good if they were given an intervening task between initial learning and recall e.g looking at three landscape paintings and being asked to describe them. 

Proactive Interference- Underwood

Analysis of studies using word lists showed that they do not remeber words at the end of the list as well as those at the beginning. Underwood found that if p's memorised 10 or more lists after 24hrs they'd only remeber 10%, if they only learnt 1 list they remebered 70% after 24hrs. 

Similarity of Material- McGeoch and McDonald

P's were given lists of 10 abjectives (list a) to learn. Once they were learnt they were given a second list (list b) to learn during a retention interval. If list B was synonyms of list A, recall was poor 12%, if…