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Some learning schedules can foster an illusion of competence, whereby the learner feels that the skill will be retained better than it actually will be. Consider fixed-order practice, in which a person practices a task repeatedly before switching to the next task (e.g., task order A, A, B, B); in contrast, in random-order practice, a person randomly alternates among two or more tasks (e.g., task order C, D, D, C). In the present experiment, participants (n = 25) who had formal training in piano practiced melodies under fixed-or randomorder conditions (within-subjects), and then returned for a retention test 2 days later. Initially, the participants performed faster on melodies practiced in a fixed-order. However, on a retention test 2 days later, participants were faster with melodies from the random-order condition. Despite the withinsubjects design, which facilitated the comparison of practice conditions, participants' metacognitive judgments indicated an illusion of competence, whereby they erroneously believed that fixed-order practice would result in faster retention performance. Our results suggest that even some trained musicians may use ease of acquisition as a heuristic for predicting future performance.

Strengthening some items in a list of words impairs free recall of the remaining items in the list-a phenomenon known as the list-strength effect (LSE; e.g., Tulving & Hastie, 1972). Research indicates that whether the LSE is observed depends on the nature of the strengthening manipulation, and the effect is attributed to the enhancement of the contextual information in the memory trace of the items (e.g., Malmberg & Shiffrin, 2005). We investigated the magnitude of the LSE as a function of individual differences in working memory capacity (WMC). The findings indicate that low-WMC participants do not show the LSE, suggesting that they do not accumulate as much contextual information in the memory trace as the remaining participants do. These results suggest that the low-spans' deficits in utilizing contextual cues during retrieval (e.g., Spillers & Unsworth, 2011) could be partly linked to their deficits in encoding and storing contextual information. Implications for global theories of memory are discussed.

This study tested whether personality influenced the effect of a help-eliciting prime. Participants (N = 203) attended two experimental sessions. In the first session, Conscientiousness was measured along with several control variables. Participants returned for a second session where they were randomly assigned to a help-eliciting prime or a Control prime. After completing the written prime exercise, participants were asked to respond to a helping scenario. Textual analyses showed that written responses to the help-eliciting prime differed across level of Conscientiousness, with individuals high in Conscientiousness writing more often about one's moral obligation to help. An ANCOVA analysis revealed a significant main effect for Conscientiousness, as well as a significant interaction effect between Conscientiousness and the Prime. Individuals scoring higher in Conscientiousness were more likely to provide assistance, and this was particularly true if they were in the help-eliciting prime condition. Our results are supportive of an interactional model where one must consider both personality and situational factors to successfully understand and predict helping responses.

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