ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the processes of retrieval, and what factors influence retrieval success. Retrieval is less effective if cues are present, but not attended, or not attended enough. One way of reducing attention to cues is by giving people a secondary task to perform during retrieval. Retrieval success depends on how associated the cues are to the target, which depends on the time and attention we spend encoding the association. The pattern is generally observed whenever people have to retrieve weakly associated items from semantic memory, and a similar principle is thought to apply to episodic memory retrieval. Retrieval often improves when more relevant cues are added. Using a retrieval strategy to increase one’s recall relies on cognitive control processes that are believed to demand proper functioning of the prefrontal cortex.
