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Subjects read a prose passage describing a home and its surroundings with either a specific objective (i.e., to consider the information from the point of view of either a burglar or a home buyer) or a more general one (to form an impression Of the situation described). Then, after reading the passage, they reconsidered the information with either the same specific objective, a different specific objective, or a more general goal in mind. Finally, they were unexpectedly asked to recall the information they had read. Considering the information with a specific objective in mind at the time it was presented increased the recall of goal-relevant material and decreased the recall of goal-irrelevant material. However, reconsidering the information with a specific goal in mind after it had been received did not have these effects. Instead, subjects' recall of both goal-relevant and goalirrelevant material was increased by reconsidering the information for the same specific purpose they had had when they initially read it. These and other results are evaluated in terms of their implications for the effects of information-processing objectives on selective attention and encoding, on incidental learning, and on the availability of retrieval cues for recalling individual aspects of the information one receives.

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