Odour and Proustian memory: reduction of context-dependent forgetting and multiple forms of memory

✍ Scribed by Amanda Parker; Henny Ngu; Helen J. Cassaday

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2000
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 80 KB
• Volume: 15
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0888-4080
• DOI: 10.1002/1099-0720(200103/04)15:2<159::aid-acp694>3.0.co;2-d

✦ Synopsis

In Experiment 0\ the reintroduction of the same ambient odour "lemon or lavender# improved performance four weeks later in both free recall and recognition of a word list[ This was a cross!over design that allowed direct comparison between congruent and incongruent odour conditions[ A further comparison with an additional group showed that memory was not improved by the presence of a di}erent odour[ Experiment 1 investigated the e}ect of two odour cues "lemon and lavender# in the same cross!over design using three learning and memory tests] "0# free recall of a word list^"1# problem solving^and "2# spatial learning[ While recall of the word list and spatial learning were best when the same odour was present at both learning and test\ there was no such context!dependent e}ect for the problem!solving task[ However\ the presence of the lavender odour at test improved performance in the problem!solving task\ irrespective of the odour present at the _rst exposure[ Thus although lavender had some e}ect on problem solving\ we saw context!dependent retrieval only in free recall and spatial learning[ We discuss the implications of this dissociation [ Copyright Þ 1990 John Wiley + Sons\ Ltd[