Context-dependent Memory - Environmental Context-dependent Memory

Environmental context-dependent memory, as defined by Smith, refers to a phenomenon whereby environmental context influences cognitive processing. As mentioned earlier, pioneering work on environmental context-dependent memory was performed by Godden and Baddeley in 1975. Their work looked at the memory recall of deep-sea divers on land and under water. Baddeley’s earlier research had indicated that the cold environment underwater could create a strong context dependency in deep sea divers. They conducted an experiment where divers were placed under water or on the beach and listened to a prerecorded list of 36 unrelated, two-and-three syllable words. After listening to the list of words they were tested on their recall of the words either in the same environment they were tested in or in the alternative environment. The results clearly showed that words learned underwater were best recalled underwater, and words learned on land were best recalled on land.