Performing action phrases (subject-performed tasks, SPTs) leads to better memory than verbal learning instructions (verbal tasks, VTs). In Experiments 1-3, the list-method directed forgetting design produced equivalent directed forgetting impairment for VTs and SPTs; however, directed forgetting enhancement emerged only for VTs, but not SPTs.…

Many accounts of working memory posit specialized storage mechanisms for the maintenance of serial order. We explore an alternative, that maintenance is achieved through temporary activation in the language production architecture. Four experiments examined the extent to which the phonological similarity effect can be explained as a sublexical…

The grouping of list items is known to improve serial memory accuracy and constrain the nature of temporal errors. A recent study (M. T. Maybery, F. B. R. Parmentier, & D. M. Jones, 2002) showed that grouping results in a temporal organization of the participants' responses that mimics the list structure but not the timing of its presentation.…

In a serial recall task, the "Hebb repetition effect" occurs when recall performance improves for a sequence repeated throughout the experimental session. This phenomenon has been replicated many times. Nevertheless, such cumulative learning seldom leads to perfect recall of the whole sequence, and errors persist. Here the authors report…

The authors revisited evidence in favor of modularity and of functional equivalence between the processing of verbal and spatial information in short-term memory. This was done by investigating the patterns of intrusions, omissions, transpositions, and fill-ins in verbal and spatial serial recall and order reconstruction tasks under control,…