Mnemotechnics: Some limitations of the mnemonic keyword method for the study of foreign language vocabulary.

Examined the effectiveness of the mnemonic keyword method in 4 experiments with 248 college students learning lists of 24–32 pairs of Spanish nouns and their English equivalents. The 1st 3 experiments, in which the lists were presented for periods of free study, yielded the following results: (a) The keyword condition, with keywords supplied by the experimenter, was similar or somewhat inferior to the control conditions in both Spanish–English (forward) and English–Spanish (backward) directions; (b) the keyword condition was clearly inferior to controls when Ss were required to generate keywords; (c) keyword and control conditions were similar in retention over 1 wk. In Exp IV the keyword method was superior to the control condition with successive, experimenter-paced presentation but inferior with free-study presentation; free study was markedly superior to paced presentation for both keyword and control conditions. (10 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)