Osgood dimensions as an encoding class in short-term memory.

Release from Proactive Interference With Positive and Negative Words

“…The present results not only replicate the basic RPI effect (Wickens, 1972), they highlight the relevance of employing a positive/negative stimulus dimension for spontaneous short term memory encoding (see also Wickens & Clark, 1968). Our results indicate that such a stimulus dimension is adequately encoded into memory.…”

“…To summarize, the present results have indicated that positive and negative words show differential RPI, validating Wickens and Clark (1968). When triad content shifted from all positive words to all negative words (and vice versa) going from Trial 3 to Trial 4, a reliable release from PI was observed.…”

“…If the RPI task shows promise with emotionally valenced stimuli, several patterns of behavior should be observed in the present experiment (see also Wickens & Clark, 1968). First, there should be no difference between experimental and control groups across Trials 1-3.…”

Connotative classification and proactive interference in short-term memory

“…The possibility that this polarity difference may have produced the release from PI in the H condition, independently of the dimensional differences, is now being explored. experiments by Turvey (1968), Wickens &Clark (1968), andSimpson (1967). The present experiment complements previous fmdings by indicating that the effect of connotative change in a STM series can be obtained with a short retention interval as well as with a long retention interval.…”

“…Sci., 1969, Vol. 16 (4) Wickens & Clark, 1968) have demonstrated that a release from PI occurs with a shift in connotation as defined by the semantic differential (Osgood, Suci, & Tannenbaum, 1957). The semantic differential defines the connotative meaning of a word by the word's location in a semantic space which has three orthogonal axes.…”