Music and word recall: The strength of familiar melodies as mnemonic devices

It is a commonly held belief that a familiar melody can increase memory for informatio n. The effects of presentation rate (fast versus slow) and presentation mode (spoken versus sung) on word recall were examined. First, a pilot experiment was conducted in order to test words for comprehensibility and frequency. In the central experiment, undergraduate volunteers were tested for word recall after listening to sentences presented in one of four between-subject conditions: fast tempo-spoken, fast tempo-sung, slow tempo-spoken, and slow tempo-sung. On a paper and pencil test, participants were asked to fill in each missing noun with the word they believed to be correct. Results show that spoken sentences were remembered better than sung sentences, but there was no difference in recall for sentences due to presentation rate. In addition, word error analyses demonstrated memory for semantically similar items across all conditions. Despite the common belief that familiar melodies can be used as mnemonic devices, the current study found that in certain situations, familiar melodies actually decrease recall.