Proactive Interference

Proactive interference (PI) is when something learned earlier impairs the ability to remember something learned more recently. PI can be observed in all subject populations and in all memory systems, including the perceptual representation system, procedural memory, semantic memory, long-term episodic memory, and short-term/working memory. One current theoretical account of PI attributes its cause to cue overload: the more items a cue subsumes, the less effective the cue will be. Other accounts suggest that items learned earlier can reduce the distinctiveness of current items, making successful retrieval less likely.