Is a Picture Really Worth a Thousand Words?

Overview

Objectives/Goals Is recall from short term memory influecned by how the information is presented? Sicne acces to inforamtion form short-term memory depends on how well information is encoded, my hypothesis is that subjects with the most elaborate encoding of information will have the best recall. I predict that the tactile group will perform the best, followed by the visual group, and lastly, by the auditory group. Methods/Materials 40 middle school students randomly assigned to 4 different groups: T(tactile, or copying), V1(words), V2(words and pictures), and A(auditory). All subjects are asked to study the same list of 20 words and recall as many as possible. The constant is the list of words. The variable is the way the words were presented. Results V2 performed the best with an average of 14 words correctly recalled, V1 had 12.4, T had 10.9, and A came in last at 10.4. V2 had an outlier of 19/20, T had an outlier of 4/20. Conclusions/Discussion Recall from short term memory does depend on the way information is presented. Recall is also affected by what type of learner one is, one's condition at the time of testing, and one's motivation.

Awards (1)

• Category Award

Competition history

• CSEF 2005 Behavioral Sciences · Entry J0326

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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