Carmichael et al (1932)

Carmichael et al (1932)

1. Aim

   • Wanted to find out if the words that were shown with pictures would have an effect on the memory for the pictures

2. Procedure

   • Laboratory experiment. Divided 95 participants into 3 groups. Each group saw 12 pictures.
   • Group 1: saw the picture and saw the label from list 1. Group 2: saw the picture and saw the label from list 2. Group 3: saw the picture with no label - this was the control group.
   • Independent variable: type of label with 3 levels. Dependent variable: how the participants drew the images they remembered

3. Results/Conclusions

   • The drawings made by people who saw list 1 words were very different to the drawings made by people who saw list 2 words.
   • Found that 73% pf the drawings matched the word given rather than the original picture
   • In the control group only 45% resembled either word
   • This shows that memory for images is reconstructured
   • The verbal context in which drawings are learned affects recall because the memory of the word affects the memory for the image

4. Strengths

   • By using a control group who did not hear or see any words, they could be sure that people's drawings were not always distorted.
   • By using 2 different word lists they showed clearly that it was the labels that affected the drawings
   • Having 12 pictures and a lot of participants helped them to be sure that it wasn't a fluke
   • The findings are supported by Tupyan (2008) who also showed that verbal labels affected memory

5. Weaknesses

   • In real life things are not generally as ambiguous as the stimulus figures were. We can generally tell what something is, so the study wasn't really very real life like
   • Prentice (1954) tested the effect of verbal labels on recognition rather than recall. The results showed that labels didn't affect recognition. This means that Carmichael's findings do not apply very widely.