A PROTOCONNECTIONIST THEORY OF MEMORY

I. A. Richards published a chapter entitled ''Memory'' in 1924 in whic h he proposed what may be viewed as the outline of a connectionist the ory of memory. However, this protoconnectionist theory attracted no su bsequent attention. There appear to be two types of reason for this ne glect. The first concerns the impossibility at that time of implementi ng the theory in the form of an explicit model. The second concerns th e nature of Richards's career. On the one hand, Richards did not himse lf subsequently develop his theory of memory any further. On the other , the fact that Richards was not generally perceived as a psychologist probably impeded the dissemination of his theory among psychologists. The neglect of Richards's theory demonstrates the range of factors, o ther than the strictly scientific, which can be important in determini ng the influence or otherwise of a psychological theory.