Facilitation and impairment of event memory produced by photograph review

Selectively reviewing some items from a larger set of previously learned it ems increases memory for the items that are reviewed but may also be accomp anied by a cost: Memory for the nonreviewed items may be impaired relative to cases where no review occurs at all. This cost to nonreviewed items has primarily been shown in contexts of verbal list learning and in situations where the reviewed and nonreviewed items are categorically or semantically related. Using a more naturalistic impetus to selective review-photographs relating to previously experienced events-we assessed whether the memory of older and younger adults for unrelated complex activities that they themse lves had performed was also impaired due to nonreview. Both younger and old er adults showed impaired memory for nonreviewed activities when tested wit h free recall (Experiment 1), but not when tested with recognition or cued recall (Experiment 2). If mitigating retrieval cues are unavailable, select ive review may impair memory for nonreviewed everyday events.