von Restorff revisited: Isolation, generation, and memory for order

The effects of isolation and generation on memory for order were investigat ed in 4 experiments. Experiments 1 and 2 examined the effect of isolation o n order retention. Previous investigations in this area have yielded equivo cal results. Experiments 1 and 2 revealed that isolation enhances memory fo r order: Isolated items were repositioned more accurately than comparable i tems in control lists. Experiments 3 and 4 investigated the effect of gener ation on order retention. These experiments revealed that generation can en hance, disrupt, or have no effect on memory for order, depending on the rel ative number of generated items appearing within a list Implications of the se results for general theoretical accounts of isolation effects in memory are discussed. A simplified version of the feature model (J. S. Nairne, 199 0) is shown to provide a general account of isolation effects.