Does an instruction to forget enhance memory for other presented items?

In an item-method directed forgetting paradigm, participants were required to attend to one of two colored words presented on opposite sides of a central fixation stimulus; they were instructed to Remember or Forget the attended item. On a subsequent recognition test, the Attended words showed a typical directed forgetting effect with better recognition of Remember words than Forget words. Our interest was in the fate of the Unattended words. When the study display disappeared before the memory instruction, there was no effect of that instruction on unattended words; when the study display remained visible during presentation of the memory instruction, there was a reverse directed forgetting effect with better recognition of unattended words from Forget trials than from Remember trials. Incidental encoding of task-irrelevant stimuli occurs following presentation of a Forget instruction – but only when those task-irrelevant stimuli are still visible in the external environment.

► Human participants attended one of two words presented to the left and right on each trial.
► Participants were instructed to Remember (R) or Forget (F) the attended word.
► Attended words were better recognized following R than F instructions.
► Unattended showed the opposite pattern but only when they remained visible.
► After an F instruction attention may be diverted to other items in the environment.