An Extension of the Kohler-Restorff Inhibition Phenomenon

Pillsbury, W. B.; Raush, Harold L.

doi:10.2307/1417511

Cited by 28 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The authors hypothesized that if isolated items are perceived as salient, then participants' JOL responses should be significantly higher for the isolated than for the control items regardless of their position in the list. Results showed that the isolation effect occurred when the item was isolated in both the second and seventh positions (the early and late isolation conditions), consistent with prior research (Bellezza & Cheney, 1973;Hunt, 1995;Kelley & Nairne, 2001;Pillsbury & Rausch, 1943;von Restorff, 1933). When the distinct item was isolated in the seventh position, participants gave significantly higher JOLs for that item than for a control item.…”

supporting

confidence: 84%

Distinctive items are salient during encoding: Delayed judgements of learning predict the isolation effect

Geraci

Manzano

2010

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Three experiments examined the role of salience in predicting superior memory for incongruent or odd items (the isolation effect). We tested the hypothesis that encoding salience emerges over the course of the encoding episode and predicts the isolation effect. In Experiment 1 participants studied lists of unrelated items and lists of categorized items containing an isolated item (from a different semantic category) that was presented either early or late in the list. Participants made delayed judgements of learning (JOLs) for studied items and were then given a free recall test. Results showed that participants had superior recall for the isolated items regardless of their list position and that delayed JOLs predicted this effect for both early and late isolation conditions. Experiment 2 replicated this delayed JOL effect using a different isolation paradigm that used only a single study list. Experiment 3 examined the specific mechanism by which isolated items become salient over the course of encoding and demonstrated that isolated items become salient as knowledge of the list structure unfolds. Results from these studies suggest that isolated items become salient over the course of the study episode, and that this salience predicts the isolation effect in memory.

show abstract

supporting

confidence: 84%

Distinctive items are salient during encoding: Delayed judgements of learning predict the isolation effect

Geraci

Manzano

2010

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Second, our replication placed the isolate exclusively in the second serial position, and the data are remarkably consistent with von Restorff's. Even more convincing is an experiment by Pillsbury and Raush (1943), who reported a substantial isolation effect even when the isolate appeared in the first serial position. Perceptual salience apparently is not necessary for obtaining an isolation effect.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The subtlety of distinctiveness: What von Restorff really did

Hunt

1995

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

249

237

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The isolation effect is a well-known memory phenomenon whose discovery is frequently attributed to von Restorff (1933). If all but one item of a list are similar on some dimension, memory for the different item will be enhanced. Modern theory of the isolation effect emphasizes perceptual salience and accompanying differential attention to the isolated item as necessary for enhanced memory. In fact, von Restorff, whose paper is not available in English, presented evidence that perceptual salience is not necessary for the isolation effect. She further argued that the difference between the isolated and surrounding items is not sufficient to produce isolation effects but must be considered in the context of similarity. Von Restorff's reasoning and data have implications for the use of distinctiveness in contemporary memory research, where distinctiveness is sometimes defined as perceptual salience and sometimes as a theoretical process of discrimination. As a theoretical construct, distinctiveness is a useful description of the effects of differences even in the absence of perceptual salience, but distinctiveness must be used in conjunction with constructs referring to similarity to provide an adequate account of the isolation effect and probably any other memory phenomena.

show abstract

“…Such an impairment has been found in some studies (e.g., Hunt & Mitchell, 1982), but not in others (e.g., Bruce & Gaines, 1976;Fabiani & Donchin, 1995). Additionally, isolation effects are obtained when the isolate is placed first in the list (e.g., Bellezza & Cheney, 1973;Kelley & Nairne, 2001;Pillsbury & Rausch, 1943). In such instances, the isolate should not receive differential attention, since no context has been established and the isolate's difference is not salient to participants.…”

Section: Attention and The Isolation Effectmentioning

confidence: 91%

Does the isolation effect require attention?

Bireta

Mazzei

2015

Mem Cogn

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

An item that differs from the surrounding items is remembered better than an item that is consistent with its surroundings; this is known as the von Restorff effect or isolation effect (von Restorff, Psychologische Forschung, 18, 299-342, 1933). Theoretical explanations have proposed that the isolate is processed differently from control items, though some research has suggested that this processing might require more attention for semantic than for physical isolates. To test this possibility, in the present study we examined the isolation effects for physical isolates and semantic isolates under full and divided attention. Participants viewed lists of categorized words, with some lists containing either a physical or a semantic isolate, followed by immediate written free recall. Across three experiments, divided attention eliminated the semantic isolation effect but did not impact the physical isolation effect. Furthermore, semantic isolates were output earlier in recall than controls, whereas physical isolates were output more similarly to controls. These findings suggest that semantic isolation effects require attention during encoding, whereas physical isolation effects are relatively automatic.

show abstract

An Extension of the Kohler-Restorff Inhibition Phenomenon

Cited by 28 publications

References 0 publications

Distinctive items are salient during encoding: Delayed judgements of learning predict the isolation effect

Distinctive items are salient during encoding: Delayed judgements of learning predict the isolation effect

The subtlety of distinctiveness: What von Restorff really did

Does the isolation effect require attention?

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About