The Role of Interference in Memory Span
There is the possibility that susceptibility to proactive interference (PI) affects performance on memory span measures. For older adults, span estimates increased with each PI-reducing manipulation; for younger adults, scores increased when multiple PI manipulations were combined or when PI-reducing manipulations were used in paradigms in which within-task PI was especially high. It is suggested that PI critically influences span performance. There might be the possibility that interference-proneness may influence cognitive behaviors previously thought to be governed by capacity.
PI-reducing procedures did act to improve span scores in many instances. The impact of PI is greater for older adults than for younger adults. Older adults showed relatively poor span performance when PI was maximal. By contrast, younger adults improved only when PI reductions were combined, suggesting that they are relatively resistant to PI. The fact that PI contributes to span performance raises a number of interesting possibilities with respect to previously held assumptions based on memory span performance. Working memory span tasks may measure interference-proneness in addition to capacity for both older and younger adults, suggest that resistance to interference may also affect performance on many cognitive tasks. Indeed, other studies show that individual differences in susceptibility to PI are predictive of scores on standard achievement tests.
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