The tendency to recall the first and last items in a list better than the middle items is known as the ________ effect.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The serial position effect refers to our tendency to remember items at the beginning and end of a list better than the middle items. This phenomenon has been attributed to the primacy effect (remembering items at the beginning of a list because they have had more time to be rehearsed and better encoded into long-term memory) and the recency effect (remembering items at the end of a list because they are still in working memory). Options B, C, and D refer to different memory retrieval and learning strategies.

The Tendency to Recall the First and Last Items in a List