Susceptibility to Interference Effects in Short-Term Memory of Normal and Retarded Readers

The short-term memory for serial order of third and fourth grade normal and retarded readers (Ns = 13) was studied. Six pictures of common objects were spatially presented and subjects were required to reconstruct the sequence. On the first six trials, the same pictures were repeatedly presented in different sequences. On the seventh trial, a new set of stimuli was introduced. Analysis of short-term memory over trials showed that normal and retarded readers were similar on Trial 1 but the performance of retarded readers deteriorated more over trials than the performance of normal readers. Short-term memory of both groups improved on Trial 7. The results indicate a greater susceptibility to interference in the short-term memory of retarded readers.