On the composition of part-set cues

Two experiments examined whether the specific composition of the set of cues might influence performance on a part-set cueing task. Although researchers traditionally have chosen their part-set cues either at random or systematically across the original set of materials, in the current study, the part-set cues comprised sets of either the most or least memorable items in the stimulus set (based on past research with the materials). With both word list (Experiment 1) and paragraph (Experiment 2) stimuli, the results showed differential effects of cue composition on part-set cueing performance. That is, part-set cueing impairment occurred following the presentation of high memorability cues, whereas there was no difference between cued and uncued performance following presentation of low memorability cues. These results suggest that the presence or absence of part-set cueing impairment can be influenced by the specific composition of the cue set.