The importance of performing versus observing meaningful actions, on the enactment benefit to memory

Abstract

Performing an action symbolic of a word during encoding aids memory for the word, relative to reading it. This subject-performed task (SPT) is known as the enactment effect. Observing an experimenter perform an action (EPT) has also been shown to aid memory, similar in magnitude to SPT. We asked whether an EPT would confer a memory benefit when the action was unrelated, and when the experimenter was not physically present, but seen in a video. Target words were presented visually one at a time. Participants enacted them, performed a non-representational gesture, or read them, depending on the encoding cue (within-subjects), or watched videos of the experimenter carrying out these tasks (between-subjects). Memory was subsequently assessed in a free-recall test. Our results show that semantic relatedness of the action to targets is critical to benefit memory, and observing others performing actions in a video attenuates the benefit conferred from meaningful actions.