Experiment no.

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Experiment name- Serial Position Curve

Introduction

The serial position effect (Glanzer & Cunitz, 1966; Murdock, 1962) is the psychological

tendency to remember the first and last items in a list better than those in the middle. It is a form

of cognitive bias which includes the primacy effect and the recency effect. The primacy effect is

the tendency to remember and place more importance on the items at the beginning of a list.

While, the recency effect is the tendency to remember the items at the end of a list (Murdock,

1962).

The serial position effect was first coined by German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus in 1885

after he conducted a series of memory experiments on himself. The serial position curve is a

consequence of this effect.

The serial position curve is a “U”-shaped learning curve that is normally obtained while recalling

a list of words due to the greater accuracy of recall of words from the beginning and end of the

list than words from the middle of the list. Variations in the ability to retrieve information are

also seen in the serial position curve. This pattern is caused by the primacy effect and recency

effect.
Applications

There are various applications of the serial position effect. Advertising- It is used in advertising

by keeping important information and the benefits of what is being advertised toward the

beginning or end of the advertisement while keeping the negatives or less important information

in the middle. This helps as the person viewing the advertisement does not remember the

information displayed in the middle or will pay less attention to it as compared to that provided

at the beginning and the end (Terry, 2010). Restaurants use this effect to make it seem like their

products are moderately priced even if they are not. They do this by placing their most expensive

or overpriced product at the top of the list so that the customer compares the cost of the other

items on the menu to the most overpriced one and is more likely to think that they are receiving a

good deal. It can also be used as a study method as it helps to learn things more effectively by

shuffling the order of your notes and studying sections of a book in a different order to the one

that is already in the book. By doing this, you will be able to learn the topics more efficiently as

all the points would have been at the end and the beginning. Teachers also use this in their

methods of teaching by placing the most important information at the beginning and end of a

slideshow and the less important information toward the middle (Green, 2020).
As all pharmaceutical companies are legally required to show the side effects of their drugs, they

try to place less emphasis on this by placing their disclaimers at the middle of their

advertisements and the benefits of their drugs at the beginning and end. By doing this, they aim

to take the consumers attention away from the side effects instead, shifting it to the benefits of

taking their drug. Even, the products in stores are arranged in such a way that the items that the

store wants you to buy are kept at the beginning and end of the aisles. The serial position effect

comes into play, and you are more likely to purchase the products that the store wants you to

purchase.

Literature Review

Most studies examining the serial position effect have focused on monolingual speakers. This

one study (Jeewon Yoo and Margarita Kaushanskaya, 2012) sought to investigate whether

bilingual individuals are affected by the serial position effect in each of their languages.

Participants who were fluent in English and Korean were presented with lists of 10, 15, and 20

items in both Korean and English and were subsequently asked to recall as many words as

possible. The results of the study revealed that bilingual individuals experienced the serial

position effect in both their primary (Korean) and secondary (English) languages. However, the

primacy effect is strengthened when there is a higher level of linguistic knowledge.

Reading or listening to a list of objects (Verbal tasks i.e., “VT”) and furthermore, performing an

action based on the object (Subject performed task i.e., SPT) has a very powerful effect on recall

performance rather than just reading or writing. There was a study (Seiler and Engelkemp, 2003)

conducted to explain the serial position curves of VT’s and SPT’s. The participants consisted of

24 students where each of them were given 4 lists that consisted of 24 action phrases. Half the
participants were instructed that the first two lists were to be recalled by reading (VT) and the

other two lists were to be recalled by replicating the action with imaginary objects (SPT). The

other half were given the same instructions but the order of lists was reversed. The phrases were

shown on a computer screen for 4 seconds with an interval of 1.5 seconds before each phrase.

After viewing each list, an oral free recall was done before starting with the next list. The result

showed that free recall performance was significantly better for SPT’s (M = 0.42, SD = 0.09)

than for VT’s (M = 0.36, SD = 0.10).

Limitations

However, there were quite a few drawbacks to the serial position effect. It lacked mundane

realism as the experiment was conducted in an artificial environment i.e., in a controlled lab

setting, it cannot be applied to a real-world situation which affects the study’s external validity

(Study Smarter, n.d). There is also a possibility that some people have the tendency to put in

more effort to achieve better results when involved in an experiment. This is called the

Hawthorne Effect. Similarly, since the sample chosen by Murdock for his study in 1962 were

psychology students, it is possible that they were able to figure out the aim of the study and act

accordingly. Furthermore, because a small sample are often used in such studies. It is difficult to

generalize the results to the entire population. Even if we use repeated measure design, it could

act as a potential extraneous variable that influences the study. Recollecting the words may have

improved with certain individuals over time. The serial position effect depends on the human

memory which is essentially flawed and unreliable. People may overlook items in the middle, at

the beginning or the end of a list, depending on their situation and the surrounding environment
(Drew, C, 2023). Despite the fact that this effect has been widely studied, it is still unclear why

people remember the beginning and end of the list better than the middle.
 References

Drew (PhD), C. (2023, March 14). Serial Position Effect: 10 Examples & Definition

(Psychology). Helpfulprofessor.com. https://helpfulprofessor.com/serial-position-effect-

psychology-examples/

Glanzer, M., & Cunitz, A. R. (1966). Two Storage Mechanisms in Free Recall. Journal of

Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 5(4), 351–360. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0022-

5371(66)80044-0

Murdock, B. B., Jr. (1962). The serial position effect of free recall. Journal of Experimental

Psychology, 64(5), 482–488. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0045106

Seiler, K. H., & Engelkamp, J. (2003). The role of item-specific information for the serial

position curve in free recall. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory,

and Cognition, 29(5), 954–964. https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.29.5.954

Serial Position Effect: Definition & Murdock | StudySmarter. (n.d.). StudySmarter UK.

https://www.studysmarter.co.uk/explanations/psychology/cognition/serial-position-effect/

Serial-position effect. (n.d.). Www.itac.edu.au. Retrieved May 28, 2022, from

https://www.itac.edu.au/blog/teaching-strategies/serial-position-effect

Terry, W. S. (2005). Serial Position Effects in Recall of Television Commercials. The Journal of

General Psychology, 132(2), 151–164. https://doi.org/10.3200/genp.132.2.151-164

Yoo, J., & Kaushanskaya, M. (2012). Phonological memory in bilinguals and monolinguals.

Memory & Cognition, 40(8), 1314–1330. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13421-012-0237-x