Running Head: ENCODING SPECIFICITY 1

Encoding Specificity

Daniel Van Zant

Florida State University

ENCODING SPECIFICITY 2

Encoding Specificity

The purpose of the experiment was to replicate the findings of Thomson and Tulving

(1970). Namely the encoding specificity principle which is properly defined in Tulving (1983).

The encoding specificity principle dictates that whether or not an event is remembered depends

on how the properties of the events encoding (the factors surrounding when the event or

information was put into long-term memory) interact with the recall conditions (what factors are

present when the event or information is remembered).

The encoding specificity principle has had many important implications in psychology.

Watkins and Tulving (1975) found that it implies that recall is easier than recognition. Morris,

Bransford, & Franks (1977) found that the encoding specificity principle implies that shallow

processing is better than deep processing. Weldon and Roediger (1988) found that the principle

implies words are recalled better than pictures. There are many more important implications of

the encoding specificity principle but these are a few of the main ones. In addition, there have

been several important studies that have replicated the encoding specificity principle. Godden

and Baddeley (1975) found that when participants studied either on land or in water and were

tested in one of those two conditions that participants did better when the context was the same

when they were studying as when they were tested. Smith (1979) had participants study in

distinct rooms and them in either the same room, a different room, or a different room while

imagining the same room and found that participants did best when tested in the same room, but

almost as good when they were tested in a different room while imagining the same room. In

Barclay et. al (1974), it was found that people remember words better when the context that the

word was learned is in the same as the context in which the word is recalled.
ENCODING SPECIFICITY 3

The experiment’s design was loosely based on Thomson and Tulving (1970). Weak and

strongly associated words were used during both encoding and recall so that the interactions

between different properties during encoding and properties during recall could be seen. Strongly

associated words are ones that people would think of as going together (such as “flower” and

“bloom”). Weak words are ones that people would not think of as going together (“flower” and

“fruit”). It is expected that people will recall words better when they have the same properties at

encoding and recall (weak words at encoding with weak words at recall and strong words at

encoding with strong words at recall).

Method

There was only one participant who was a 21 year-old english speaking male. The

experimental design was loosely based on the one used in Thomson and Tulving (1970).

Participants went through three distinct phases of the experiment. In Phase I, the participant was

shown pairs of words where one word was in lowercase (the target) and the other word was in

uppercase (the cue). Participant was 48 pairs of words each displaying for a few seconds with a

blank screen in between each pair. In Phase II, the participant was shown a cue word in

lowercase and a target word in uppercase similar to Phase I, the difference being that the

participant was asked whether or not they saw the target word in Phase I. There were 96 word

pairs shown in Phase II.

The independent variable for this study was the type of cue used. There were two levels

to this variable. weak and strong. Weak cues were ones that are weakly associated with the target

word (such as “fruit” with “flower”), strong cues are ones that are strongly associated with the
ENCODING SPECIFICITY 4

target (such as “bloom” with “flower”). The dependent variable is the proportion of times that

the word was correctly judged as seen before for each condition.

The proportion of words that were correctly judged as appearing in Phase I, in Phase II,

was calculated for 4 conditions: weak cue in Phase I with weak cue in Phase II, weak cue in

Phase I with strong cue in Phase II, strong cue in Phase I with weak cue in Phase II, strong cue in

Phase I with strong cue in Phase II.

Results

The proportion correct was calculated for 4 different conditions. The proportion correct

for a weak cue in Phase I as well as a weak cue in Phase II was 33.3%. The proportion correct

for a weak cue in Phase I as well as a strong cue in Phase II was 25.0%. The proportion correct

for a strong cue in Phase I as well as a weak cue in Phase II was 8.3%. The proportion correct for

a strong cue in Phase I as well as a strong cue in Phase II was 66.7%. In addition, the lures

(answers that appeared in Phase II that were not in Phase I) were chosen 87.5% of the time that

they were shown. All of this information is shown in figure 1.

The proportion correct was higher for both same cue conditions (weak/weak or

strong/strong) than for either of the different cue conditions. The average of the proportion

correct for the conditions where there was a strong cue was slightly lower than the average of the

proportion correct where there was a weak cue. The average of the proportion correct where

there was a strong cue in Phase II is higher than the average of the proportion correct where there

was a weak cue in Phase II.

Discussion
ENCODING SPECIFICITY 5

The purpose of the experiment was to replicate the findings of Thomson and Tulving

(1970). The findings were fully replicated. It was expected that people would recall words better

when there was the same condition at encoding as at recall and the finding held true. This is

likely because of the encoding specificity principle which implies that the ability to remember an

event depends on the interaction between the properties of the encoded information and the

properties of the encoded retrieval information. The study is limited in that it was only done with

one property at encoding and recall. It could be improved if multiple properties were used (such

as having words that are both lowercase and both uppercase in addition to words that are

congruently strong and weak).

ENCODING SPECIFICITY 6

References

Barclay, J., Bransford, J. D., Franks, J. J., Mccarrell, N. S., & Nitsch, K. (1974).

Comprehension and semantic flexibility. ​Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior,

13​(4), 471-481. doi:10.1016/s0022-5371(74)80024-1

Ecphoric processes in episodic memory. (1983). ​Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society

of London. B, Biological Sciences,​ ​302(​ 1110), 361-371. doi:10.1098/rstb.1983.0060

Godden, D. R., & Baddeley, A. D. (1975). Context-Dependent Memory In Two Natural

Environments: On Land And Underwater. ​British Journal of Psychology,​ ​66(​ 3), 325-331.

doi:10.1111/j.2044-8295.1975.tb01468.x

Morris, C. D., Bransford, J. D., & Franks, J. J. (1977). Levels of processing versus transfer

appropriate processing. ​Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior,​ ​16(​ 5), 519-533.

doi:10.1016/s0022-5371(77)80016-9

Smith, S. M. (1979). Remembering in and out of context. ​Journal of Experimental Psychology:

Human Learning & Memory,​ ​5(​ 5), 460-471. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.5.5.460

Thomson, D. M., & Tulving, E. (1970). Associative encoding and retrieval: Weak and strong

cues. ​Journal of Experimental Psychology,​ ​86(​ 2), 255-262. doi:10.1037/h0029997

Watkins, M. J., & Tulving, E. (1975). Episodic memory: When recognition fails. ​Journal of

Experimental Psychology: General,​ ​104​(1), 5-29. doi:10.1037/0096-3445.104.1.5

Weldon, M. S., & Roediger, H. L. (1987). Altering retrieval demands reverses the picture

superiority effect. ​Memory & Cognition,​ ​15(​ 4), 269-280. doi:10.3758/bf03197030

Running Head: ENCODING SPECIFICITY 7

Figure 1. Percentage correct in each condition. Weak or Strong indicates weak or strong

words at Phase I.