2012 Volume 60 Issue 3 Pages 285-295
The present study investigated whether a thought-generation strategy aids intentional memory suppression. When a thought-generation strategy is used, the individual generates a thought related to a cue for a target, and thinks about it in order to suppress the memory of the target occurring in response to the cue. The participants in the study were university students (average age, 18.76 years; 14 men, 15 women). In an experiment in which a think/no-think task (Anderson & Green, 2001) was used, the memory suppression of individuals in a control group (n=15) was compared to that of individuals in a thought-generation strategy group (n=14). Successful memory suppression was observed only for cued-recall performances and recognition reaction times in the participants in the thought-generation strategy group ; the subjective difficulty reported by the participants in the thought-generation strategy group during suppression was significantly lower than that reported by the participants in the control group. Accordingly, it is proposed that a thought-generation strategy may enhance intentional memory suppression.
