[Effects of types of sentence frame on elaboration in memory]

Two experiments were carried out to investigate the effects of types of sentence frame on elaboration in incidental memory. Subjects were asked to rate whether the target word would fit into sentence frame with five point scales followed by an unexpected free recall test. In Experiment I, three types of sentence frame (CA, CN and II) were used. The target words fitted into CA and CN sentence frames, but did not into II ones. In a CA sentence frame, two associates of the target word were involved, whereas in a CN one were not. CA and CN sentence frames led to a better recall than II ones, but the difference between the former two sentence frames was not observed. In Experiment II, three types of sentence frames were used: Semantic and Syntactic Congruous (CC) Semantic Incongruous and Syntactic Congruous (CI) and Semantic and Syntactic Incongruous (II). CC and CI sentence frames led to a better recall than II, but the difference between the former two sentence frames was not observed.