How come a class can sing the alphabet, yet not be able to spell words easily? Why is it that a class did well in an exercise, but when you tested them using a different type of question they struggled?
Transfer-Appropriate Processing is one of those potentially off-putting jargon terms from cognitive psychology. It describes something actually very significant from a language teacher's point of view. Knowing about it helps answer questions such as these:
- How can I best design tests to help students succeed?
- How can I match my lessons to the assessment regime?
- How can I help students remember what I taught them?
Below is what we wrote about it in our recently published book about memory.
When you teach a class of beginners to recite the alphabet to a tune, they are likely to remember it successfully. If you then ask them to recite the alphabet without the same tune, they will find it harder. What does this tell us?
Edward Thorndike’s Theory of Identical Elements (Thorndike, 1914) stated that transfer of learning from one context to another depends on the level of similarity between the environment of the training and performance. When we learn something, our memories record not only the information learned, but the cognitive and perceptual processes that were involved when the learning took place. Subsequently, when we try to retrieve the information from memory, we also recall aspects of the learning process.
In more recent times, research going back to Donald Morris and colleagues in 1977 has supported Thorndike’s view. The greater the similarity between processing types used in learning something and those activated in our later efforts to retrieve that knowledge, the greater the chances of successfully learning it. This means that, since memory retrieval is affected by the context of the initial learning, students can learn in one context and fail to transfer it to another. Think, for instance, of a student who was able to perform a verb tense drill repeatedly and accurately, yet failed to write verbs correctly in a written composition.
The theory of Transfer-Appropriate Processing (TAP) states, therefore, that memory performs best when the processes engaged in during the encoding process match those engaged in during retrieval. In particular, retrieval is better when you supply the same cues present when the initial learning took place. If those cues are missing, for example the tune accompanying the alphabet, memory is weaker.
This was exemplified in a study by Morris et al. (1977) in relation to semantic and rhyming tests. When people were asked to remember the meaning of words, memory was better for those who focused on meaning rather than rhyme. However, for those who were asked to remember words which rhymed, memory was better if they had used rhyme to process the words rather than meaning.
Put simply, learners do best when they are asked to retrieve words in a fashion and/or context most similar to the way in which they learned them. If you fail to provide the same cues on retrieval as were given during the initial learning, then memory will be more likely to fail. This is known in the jargon as cue-dependent forgetting. If we take the classic activity of memorising words from a bilingual list, students will appear to remember the words better if you test through translating with words in the same order as in the original list. If you suddenly test students on that same vocabulary in a different way, for example in a gap-fill task, they are likely to recall the words less well.
The link between memory and language
TAP is one example of the so-called encoding specificity principle, according which memories are more successfully retrieved if they are recalled in the same context as when they were originally encoded.
Cognitive psychologists Viorica Marian and Ulric Neisser (the so-called father of cognitive psychology) found that autobiographical memories are more accessible when retrieved in the same language in which they were originally encoded or learned. They asked Russian-English bilinguals to recall specific life experiences in response to word prompts. Participants retrieved more experiences from the Russian-speaking period of their lives when interviewed in Russian and more experiences from the English-speaking period of their lives when interviewed in English (Marian and Neisser, 2000).
The researchers suggest that language is encoded as part of episodic memory (an autobiographical event) which makes the memory trace stronger, and that language at the time of retrieval, like other forms of context, plays a significant role in determining what will be remembered. Memory is tied up with language.
References
Marian V. & Neisser, U.G. (2000). Language-dependent recall of autobiographical memories. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 129 (3), 361-368.
Morris, C.D., Bransford, J.D. & Franks, J.J. (1977). Levels of Processing Versus Transfer Appropriate Processing. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 16, 519533.
Smith, S.P & Conti, G. (2021). Memory: What Every Language Teacher Should Know. Independently published.
Thorndike, E.L. (1914). The Psychology of Learning. New York: Teachers College.
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