Interference theory suggests that older and more recent memories can interfere with each other, making it harder to remember. This can be seen in memorization experiments and can affect everyday life, such as adjusting to a new job. The exact mechanism is not fully understood.
Interference theory is a scientific concept that deals with how memories are stored in a person’s brain. According to the interference theory, older and more recent memories can interfere with each other. New memories can make older memories harder to remember, and old memories can make new memories somewhat difficult to keep. There is a fair amount of scientific evidence to support the interference theory, but the exact mechanism behind it is not fully understood.
In general, memories only interfere with each other when they are concentrated in similar areas of thought. For example, if an individual spends many years learning a martial art, mastering a very specific pattern of movements and reactions, these can become very deeply ingrained in his mind. Once those memories are in place, it can make training in a new set of similar skills more difficult. The individual’s ability to retain new information may be overwhelmed by the deeply ingrained training he or she has previously received. If the person continues to work at it, the interference effect can potentially be overcome, but it’s not always easy to do.
Interference theory can also work the other way around. A new memory could potentially interfere with an attempt to remember something old. Sometimes it takes a while for a new memory to replace the old one, but once that happens, it can potentially make recall quite difficult. Most experts generally agree that old memories aren’t actually lost when they’re replaced. Instead, they are thought to be simply inaccessible in some way. An example of replacing an old memory would be learning a new email address or password and then being unable to recall an older one.
One way that scientists have studied interference theory is through experiments with memorization. Subjects in these studies are typically asked to memorize something, such as a list or names of people in pictures, and once the information has been fully learned, they are asked to learn even more similar information. Overall, the results of these tests conclusively demonstrated that the person’s memory performance continuously decreased with each additional period of memorization.
There are many ways that interference theory could potentially affect someone’s experience of everyday life. For example, if people are asked to adjust to a new way of doing things in their job, they may find that memory interference greatly hinders their progress. Sometimes people find it very difficult to unlearn old patterns of behavior.
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