Contrary to previous indications, retroactive interference in long-term paired associate learning was found to be a function of acoustic similarity. Experimental groups were exposed to the A–B, A′–C paradigm where corresponding stimuli were homophones. Their retention scores were substantially and significantly lower than control groups run with an A–B, C–D paradigm. The failure of previous studies to reveal effects of acoustic similarity in this way is attributed to the use of an insufficiently high degree of similarity.
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