1. Introductory Topics in Psychology: Paper 1
Interference theory of forgetting

2. To Start…
A Quick Test
Last lesson we had to learn a set of short words and long words.
How many of them can you remember today?

3. How many did you get correct?
Last lesson Words
How many did you get correct?
Why?
Association
Representative
Discouragement
Meaningfulness
Suppression
Enhancing
Component
Performances
Forgetting
Damaging
Harm
Twice
Calm
Share
Tree
Book
Sun
Four
Key
Short

4. By the end of the lesson…
Success Criteria
What is interference theory and how does it explain forgetting?
By the end of the lesson…
Understand
To describe interference theory of forgetting.
Apply
To explain real life examples of interference theory.
Analyse
To compare and contrast different types of interference.
Evaluate
To discuss strengths, weaknesses and evidence of interference theory of forgetting.

5. Important
You need to know two theories of forgetting! These are different from theories of memory.
Interference Theory
Retrieval Failure

6. What is Interference? Forgetting Clip
The Multistore model of memory states that LTM has an unlimited capacity, and memories have a duration of potentially a lifetime.
However, we know by experience that we forget information stored in the LTM.
But does that mean the memories are gone (availability), or we just can’t reach them (accessibility) ?

7. Forgetting
What is Interference?

8. Imagine you have learned to drive a car in the UAE – you drive on the right hand side of the road.
You then fly to England for a holiday and hire a car. Driving out of the airport, you narrowly avoid causing an accident because you failed to drive on the left – which type of interference is this???
Then you return to the UAE, and driving out of the car park you find yourself in the right hand lane – which type of interference is this?

9. Time for another memory test!
Forgetting
Time for another memory test!
You are going to see 10 words on the screen. Try and remember as many as you can!

10. Forgetting
Frame

11. Forgetting
Song

12. Forgetting
Bold

13. Forgetting
Feet

14. Forgetting
Clock

15. Forgetting
Cushion

16. Forgetting
Walk

17. Forgetting
Wave

18. Forgetting
Anger

19. Forgetting
Plant

20. Now re-call as many of the ten words as you can remember! 
Forgetting
Task:
Now complete the word search as a re-cap of last lesson on the working memory model.
Now re-call as many of the ten words as you can remember! 
Frame Cushion
Song Walk
Bold Wave
Feet Anger
Clock Plant

21. Now lets try again: Round 2
Forgetting
Now lets try again: Round 2
You are going to see another 10 words on the screen. Try and remember as many as you can!

22. Forgetting
Speak

23. Forgetting
Sound

24. Forgetting
Two

25. Forgetting
Ring

26. Forgetting
Retain

27. Forgetting
Visible

28. Forgetting
Focal

29. Forgetting
Manager

30. Forgetting
Breadth

31. Forgetting
Consequence

32. Now re-call as many of the ten words as you can remember! 
Forgetting
Task:
Now finish off the word search
Now re-call as many of the ten words as you can remember! 
Speak Visible
Sound Focal
Two Manager
Ring Breadth
Retain Consequence

33. Which words were recalled better? Why?
Forgetting
Which words were recalled better? Why?
Evidence has shown that the more similar the interference is to the words being remembered, the worst recall is.
In this case, the words on the word had similar meanings to the second round of words. Therefore we would expect the similarity to interfere with our recall of the words = worse recall!
This was found by McGeoch & Mcdonald in 1931

34. Forgetting Confident so far? Understand
If you are still feeling unsure…
Read the text book and write notes on Proactive/Retroactive interference summaries in your workbooks.
Apply
Read the three sets of evidence on your worksheet.
Underwood & Postman
Baddeley & Hitch
McGeoch & Mcdonald
Write a conclusion for each study, explaining what it suggests about interference theory.
Evaluate
How can each of these pieces of evidence be evaluated? In terms of their methods?

35. Forgetting
Evaluate
1) Most of the studies supporting this theory come from laboratory experiments. Why is that a limitation?
2) However this can also be a strength. Explain
3) Does it take into account the nature of the material to be remembered?
4) Baddeley (1990) states that the tasks given to participants are too close to each other. What happens in real life? Give an example.
5) The research does not investigate whether the information has “disappeared” or can be recovered later. Why is that a limitation?

36. Apply it Forgetting Caleb
Now you’ve learned it, can you explain real life situations…?
Caleb