The Warming-Up Effect in Recall Performance

Abstract

Two experiments on recall are reported. In the first, 120 adults recall, in successive 3-rninute sessions, names which begin with a particular letter of the alphabet, a different letter being used in each session. The second experiment differs from the first in interpolating a 20-minute lecture between the first and second sessions. The major finding is that the performance of one recall task (e.g. recalling names which begin with. N) facilitates the performance of a subsequent and similar, but not identical, recall task (e.g. recalling names which begin with K), provided the two tasks occur within a relatively short time of each other. This facilitation has the characteristics of warming-up and suggests that recall may, if only for heuristic purposes, be regarded as a high-level skill. Two minor findings are reported which indicate problems for future investigation.