The effects of dual task on the retrieval inhibition in emotional memory

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Retrieval inhibition refers to temporary inaccessibility of learned materials with leaving their availability unaffected. One of the procedures for studying retrieval inhibition is directed forgetting paradigm. In this paradigm, participants are asked to learn two lists of items that they will later have to recall. After study the first list of items, one group of participants (i.e., F group) are instructed to forget the items they have just leaned and remember only the second list for upcoming recall test. In contrast, the other group (i.e., R group) are instructed to remember both first and second lists of items, which they will have to later recall. At recall test, all the participants are required to recall all previously learned items. Typically, as for the first list the F group shows lower recall performance than the R group. Such a directed forgetting effect is interpreted in terms of retrieval inhibition. In this paper, I report four experiments to investigate whether retrieval inhibition in the directed forgetting paradigm emerges using emotionally negative materials. Specifically, in the first two experiments using negative words, I obtained the typical directed forgetting effect and found that the effect was disappeared by a concurrent memory load during the presentation of second list. In the third and forth experiment with negative pictures, I found the similar directed forgetting effect, but the effect was not disrupted by concurrent memory load. I make a brief summary and some perspectives on the retrieval inhibition in the directed forgetting paradigm.