A first study, free recall, showed that the von Restorff effect could be produced by the interpolation of a photograph of nude human beings at Serial Position 8 in a 15-item list consisting of line drawings of familiar objects. This effect was accompanied by a retrograde amnesia at the two serial positions immediately preceding the interpolated item. A substantial anterograde amnesia resulted from the nude photograph, affecting the 6 following positions. A second study presented 5s a recognition task. Lists of 30 photographs from popular magazines were shown at .75-sec. or l.SO-sec. rates, and recognition memory for 12 of the positions was probed by presenting 12 old and 12 new pictures on a "test" trial. Photographs of nudes were interpolated at Serial Position IS. A profound anterograde amnesia resulted, with the effect being greater for the .75-sec. rate. No retrograde amnesia resulted.

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The investigators assessed the effects of two variables, overt labelling and cultural differences, on the short-term-memory performance of young children. Middle-class, white nursery school children and low-socioeconomicstatus Negroes (from Head Start) of the same age, were given the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT), a digit-span test, and a six-position short-term-memory task. Cultural differences were not related to digitspan or short-term-memory performance. The middle-class children scored 43.7 IQ points higher on the PPVT. For both groups, overt labelling differentially affected the primacy and recency segments of the serial position curve. Those who labelled the stimuli as presented performed significantly more poorly in primacy and significantly better in recency, supporting the hypothesis that young children rehearse in short-term-memory tasks.The effects of having subjects overtly label items in memory tasks is unclear. Studies of short-term memory with subjects ranging in age from 10 years to adulthood (e.g., Ellis, 1969;Glanzer & Meinzer, 1967;Hagen & Kingsley, 1968) have shown a decrement in primacy and a facilitation in recency portions of the serial position curve as a result of overtly labeling stimuli. Since primacy performance is presumably facilitated by rehearsal, oral labeling is believed to preempt rehearsal time. On the other hand such a