Word Dose in the Disruption of Serial Recall by Irrelevant Speech: Phonological Confusions or Changing State?

1996 ◽  
Vol 49 (4) ◽  
pp. 919-939 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew M. Bridges ◽  
Dylan M. Jones
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Serial Recall ◽  
Phonological Similarity ◽  
Verbal Material ◽  
Irrelevant Speech ◽  
Dose Effect ◽  
State Information ◽  
Cast Doubt ◽  
Irrelevant Speech Effect

Irrelevant background speech disrupts serial recall of visually presented lists of verbal material. Three experiments tested the hypothesis that the degree of disruption is dependent on the number of words heard (i.e. word dose) whilst the task was undertaken. Experiments 1 and 2 showed that more disruption is produced if the word dose is increased, thereby providing evidence to support the experimental hypothesis. It was concluded from the first two experiments that the word-dose effect might be the result of increasing the amount of changing-state information in the speech. The results of Experiment 3 supported this conclusion by showing an interaction between word dose and changing-state information. It was noted however that the results might be explained within the working memory account of the disruptive action of irrelevant speech. A further two experiments cast doubt on this possibility by failing to replicate the finding that the phonological similarity between heard and seen material affects the degree of interference (Salamé & Baddeley, 1982). The findings are discussed in relation to the changing state hypothesis of the irrelevant speech effect (e.g. Jones, Madden, & Miles, 1992).

scholarly journals The irrelevant speech effect and working memory load

NeuroImage ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 1107-1116 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Gisselgård ◽  
Karl Magnus Petersson ◽  
Martin Ingvar
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Memory Load ◽  
Irrelevant Speech ◽  
Working Memory Load ◽  
Irrelevant Speech Effect

Phonological Similarity Effect is Abolished by a Silent Mouthing Task

1993 ◽  
Vol 76 (2) ◽  
pp. 427-431 ◽  
Author(s):  
Satoru Saito
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Serial Recall ◽  
Phonological Similarity ◽  
Memory Model ◽  
Period Analysis ◽  
Clear Advantage ◽  
Phonological Similarity Effect ◽  
Similarity Effect ◽  
Working Memory Model

This experiment was designed to examine the effect of silent mouthing on the phonological similarity effect. 16 undergraduates were tested for serial recall of visually presented letter sequences that were either phonologically similar or dissimilar. The letter sequences had to be remembered under two conditions, a control condition and a silent mouthing condition in which subjects had to articulate irrelevant words silently during the study period. Analysis showed the clear advantage of the dissimilar sequence over the similar one in the control condition. In contrast, this phonological similarity effect disappeared in the silent mouthing condition. This result is consistent with the working memory model.

On the Irrelevance of Phonological Similarity to the Irrelevant Speech Effect

1997 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 100-118 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. LeCompte Denny ◽  
Deborah M. Shaibe
Keyword(s):  
Visual Stimuli ◽  
Phonological Similarity ◽  
Irrelevant Speech ◽  
Immediate Recall ◽  
Critical Experiment ◽  
Phonological Store ◽  
Irrelevant Speech Effect

Irrelevant background speech disrupts immediate recall of visually presented items. Salame and Baddeley (1982) found that increasing the phonological similarity between the irrelevant speech and the visual items greatly increased this disruption. In contrast, Jones and Macken (1995) found little evidence for such an increase. The present experiments directly manipulated the phonological similarity of the irrelevant speech background and the to-be-remembered visual items. Experiments 1–4 compared background speech that shared virtually no phonemes with the visual stimuli with background speech that shared all of the phonemes of the visual stimuli. No effect of phonological similarity was found. Experiment 5 replicatedthe method of Salame and Baddeley's critical experiment but not their results. With regard to the two primary explanations of the irrelevant speech effect, these data present a strong challenge to the phonological store hypothesis while offering some support to the changing state hypothesis.

scholarly journals The phonological loop model of working memory: An ERP study of irrelevant speech and phonological similarity effects

1997 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 471-483 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuel Martín-Loeches ◽  
Stefan R. Schweinberger ◽  
Werner Sommer
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Phonological Similarity ◽  
Irrelevant Speech ◽  
Phonological Loop ◽  
Loop Model

On the Irrelevance of Semantic Information for the “Irrelevant Speech” Effect

1996 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 765-779 ◽  
Author(s):  
Axel Buchner ◽  
Lisa Irmen ◽  
Edgar Erdfelder
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Similarity ◽  
Serial Recall ◽  
Semantic Information ◽  
Semantic Distance ◽  
Irrelevant Speech ◽  
Acoustic Information ◽  
Visual Targets ◽  
Irrelevant Speech Effect

Two experiments that tested whether semantic similarity between visually presented targets and auditorily presented distractors has an effect on serial recall of the visual targets are reported. In Experiment 1, we found no difference in the recall of two-digit numbers when distractors were either numbers or words and non-words that were designed to be phonologically similar to the targets. In Experiment 2 the “semantic distance” between targets and distractors had no effect on serial recall. Taken together, these experiments conceptually replicate and extend earlier results, and they establish constraints for models of the effect of unattended acoustic information on serial recall.

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