Describe the concept of the serial position effect. How might the serial position effect be explained by proactive and retroactive interference

Answer & Explanation:

Serial position effect: In psychology, the term "serial position effect" is described as a finding that, on a particular "list-learning tasks", the possibility of retrieving certain item is dependent on the other items' position in that particular study list.

In other words, it is referred to as the psychological propensity for an individual to remember the last & the first item better than that of the other words or items present in the middle of the given list. It usually happens because of the greater amount of time that occurs between the starting of the list and then in recalling those words or information whereby to rehearse the items.

The serial position effect can be described via proactive and retroactive interference in such a way that in both the cases of scenarios specific information is being difficult to remember or comes in between while recalling certain item. In both the concepts, an individual tends to forget certain information while recalling.