Question

Your roommate always sings in the shower and in the car on the way to school. In the shower, he just sings songs from memory (no radio playing), but in the car, he sings along with the radio, even with those he is not too familiar with. Although he knows the words, he rarely knows what the words mean. Sometimes he makes more errors when he is familiar with the song.

in terms of his memory, what could be happening?

Answer 1

In terms of memory processes, my roommate seems to be able to perform better under conditions of free recall (singing in the shower from memory) rather than the conditions of cued recall (singing in the car with the song playing). However, in the latter case, because he also sings along to songs he is not very familiar with, it might be causing retroactive interference. These new unfamiliar songs maybe interfering with his ability to recall previously learned songs adequately.