Research Symposium

BIO

My name is Haydee Byars-Weiser, I am from Dover, DE, and I am a third year student studying Behavioral Neuroscience here at FSU. I intend to go to medical school, and have aspirations of becoming a Pediatric Geneticist. My research interests lie in how physiology and genetic predisposition affects overall behavior and determine conditions. Currently, I am a DIS student in the Martin Memory Lab, a teaching assistant for Biology Lab for Non-Majors, and am interning at Tallahassee Orthopedic Clinic as a Medical Assistant.

The Effects of Narrative on Memory Through Seinfeld

Abstract

It has been known that the act of retrieving a memory can invoke forgetting of related information. This phenomena can be attributed to inhibitory processes. Past research also indicates that coherent narratives drive memory integration. These mechanisms influence the motivation for the current study. On day one, we presented participants with two episodes of the sitcom “Seinfeld”, which were either an original unaltered episode (coherent narrative), or an altered episode that featured different scenes derived from multiple, unrelated episodes (incoherent narrative). During the retrieval practice phase, we provided six retrieval cues to induce recall for specific scenes from the first episode watched. On day two, participants were asked the same six retrieval cues (RP+) as day one, six separate from episode one (RP-), and twelve cues (NRP) from the second episode watched. In the incoherent narrative condition, we found a significant effect of retrieval induced forgetting. We also found a main effect of trial type, such that in both conditions, in the RP+ trials participants recalled more average details than in the RP- and NRP trials. Moreover, we found a significant condition by trial type interaction, where the effect of retrieval induced forgetting depends on what condition you are in. Previous studies have explored the idea of retrieval induced forgetting with the use of word lists, however our study is unique because we look at this idea through the lens of naturalistic stimuli. This study also implies the idea that narrative can be utilized to retain memory.

Keywords: Narrative Memory Retrieval Forgetting Seinfeld