Memory Transfer Process: An Extension of the Sternberg Paradigm

Research conducted by Sternberg (1969) has suggested that there is a transfer process, a cognitive process for activating stored knowledge. His research and that of those who have replicated and extended it have concentrated on distinct declarative lists of information. In two experiments, we have sought to extend this area by studying the cognitive processes for activating an action plan, a sequence of mental operations executed to achieve a goal. Results showed that (a) longer action plans took more time to activate, and (b) when the activation process was interrupted before completion, the process had to be restarted from its beginning after the interruption had been dealt with. These results were interpreted as evidence for a time-consuming transfer process in which the elements of action plans are transferred from long-term store to short-term store. These results are compared with other current data on the transfer process, and implications for the use of controlled knowledge in cognitive tasks are discussed.