The loss of repetition priming and automaticity over time as a function of degree of initial learning

Two experiments were performed to investigate the buildup of repetition priming in a lexical decision task with repeated presentations and its decline over the course of 2 months. Priming was found to accumulate as a power function of presentations and to decline as a power function of time. Accuracy measures indicated that the loss rate of priming was unaffected by the amount of initial priming. Response time measures indicated the same result when the experiments were analyzed separately; however, when the data were combined, increased initial priming was associated with greater losses in priming over time. The data were interpreted in terms of automaticity, and the power function decline in priming was taken as support for memory-based models of automaticity. Possible ways to incorporate forgetting into memory-based theories of automaticity are discussed.