Psychology2016

252 CHAPTER 6

A similar problem was experienced in the case of A. R. Luria’s (1968) famous mne-

monist, Mr. S. (A mnemonist is a memory expert or someone with exceptional memory

ability.) Mr. S. was a performing mnemonist, astonishing his audiences with lists of num-

bers that he memorized in minutes. But Mr. S. found that he was unable to forget the lists.

He also could not easily separate important memories from trivial ones, and each time he

looked at an object or read a word, images stimulated by that object or word would flood

his mind. He eventually invented a way to “forget” things—by writing them on a piece

of paper and then burning the paper (Luria, 1968).

The ability to forget seems necessary to one’s sanity if the experience of Mr. S. is any

indicator. But how fast do people forget things? Are there some things that are harder or

easier to forget?

Ebbinghaus and the Forgetting Curve

6.10 Describe the "curve of forgetting."

Hermann Ebbinghaus (1913) was one of the first researchers to study forgetting. Because

he did not want any verbal associations to aid him in remembering, he created several

lists of “nonsense syllables,” pronounceable but meaningless (such as GEX and WOL).

He memorized a list, waited a specific amount of time, and then tried to retrieve the

list, graphing his results each time. The result has become a familiar graph: the curve of

forgetting. This graph clearly shows that forgetting happens quickly within the first hour

after learning the lists and then tapers off gradually. (See Figure 6. 7 .) In other words,

forgetting is greatest just after learning. This curve can be applied to other types of infor-

mation as well. Although meaningful material is forgotten much more slowly and much

less completely, the pattern obtained when testing for forgetting is similar (Conway et al.,

1992).

In his early studies, Ebbinghaus (1885) found that it is also important not to try

to “cram” information you want to remember into your brain. Research has found that

spacing out one’s study sessions, or distributed practice, will produce far better retrieval

of information studied in this way than does massed practice, or the attempt to study a

body of material all at once. For example, studying your psychology material for 3 hours

may make you feel that you’ve done some really hard work, and you have. Unfortu-

nately, you won’t remember as much of what you studied as you would if you had

curve of forgetting
a graph showing a distinct pattern in
which forgetting is very fast within the
first hour after learning a list and then
tapers off gradually.

distributed practice
spacing the study of material to be
remembered by including breaks
between study periods.

Figure 6.7 Curve of Forgetting

Ebbinghaus found that his recall of words from his memorized word lists was greatest immediately after

learning the list but rapidly decreased within the first hour. After the first hour, forgetting leveled off.

100

80

60

40

20

Per

centage r

emember

ed

246810 15

Elapsed time (days)

Immediate recall

20 minutes

1 hour

9 hours

0 20 25 31

Interactive