Some people claim they can learn new information while their attention is divided. Think of the college student who is watching television while studying for an exam. Such claims appear not to be true. Murphy and colleagues evaluated the ability of participants to learn new information while dividing their attention between studying a list of words and performing a secondary auditory detection task. They found that, compared to participants who could devote their full attention to studying the list of words, participants with divided attention performed less well in recalling the list of words later. Interestingly, the effect of divided attention while recalling the list of words was less severe. Does this mean that while students should not watch television while studying, it would be okay for them to listen to a baseball game while taking their final exam? Perhaps, but I wouldn’t recommend it!
Abstract
Value-directed remembering refers to the tendency to best remember important information at the expense of less valuable information, and this ability may draw on strategic attentional processes. In six experiments, we investigated the role of attention in value-directed remembering by examining memory for important information under conditions of divided attention during encoding and retrieval. We presented participants with lists of words of varying objective or subjective value and compared participants completing the study phase under full or divided attention, in addition to participants completing the testing phase under full or divided attention. Results revealed that certain forms of selectivity were impaired when attention was divided during encoding but not when attention was divided during retrieval. Participants initiated recall (i.e., probability of first recall [PFR]) with high-value words as well as with words they subjectively deemed important; these value-mediated PFR retrieval dynamics resisted influence from reduced attentional resources during encoding and retrieval. Thus, while value-directed remembering involves both strategic encoding and retrieval operations, attentional resources during encoding appear crucial for subsequent recollection of valuable and important information; however, attentional resources during retrieval may be less influential in strategic selective memory.
Citation
Murphy, D. H., Schwartz, S. T., & Castel, A. D. (2024). Value-directed retrieval: The effects of divided attention at encoding and retrieval on memory selectivity and retrieval dynamics. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 50(1), 17–38.
Dr Martin Fracker 