EFFECTS OF ORGANIZATION AND SEMANTIC SIMILARITY ON RECALL AND RECOGNITION

Three experiments were performed to extend the previous finding that number of cate-gories (NC) in organized, categorized lists determines the number of words recalled. The NC also influences recognition both in immediate tests and in a delay of two weeks. False alarm rates in recognition are generally unaffected by the use of synonyms as fillers, suggesting that perceptual features of words are used at least in addition to semantic features. To accommodate the novel finding that organization affects recognition, a model for the case of subject-organized lists was presented which introduces the notion of a postrecognition retrieval check. Previous findings on the relation between NC and recall were replicated. © 1969 Academic Press Inc. All rights reserved.