Lexical Neighborhoods and Release from Proactive Interference: A First Report

The effect of lexical competition on recall performance was studied using the release from proactive interference paradigm. Word triads were equated in terms of local neighborhood density but varied on global neighborhood density, neighborhood frequency, and word frequency to create sets of lexically “easy” and “hard” words. Proactive interference was built up across four trials of either “easy” or “hard” words and “released” on the fifth trial with words from the opposite lexical category. The results failed to support the prediction that greater release from proactive interference would be observed when switching from “hard” to “easy” words, although some evidence for a reversal of the release effect was found when switching from “easy” to “hard” words. Extensions to the current design and future studies using this experimental paradigm are discussed.