The effects of grouping on the learning and long-term retention of spatial and temporal information

In three experiments, participants learned either the temporal sequence or the spatial arrangement of a list of 18 words, presented 1 at a time, each in a different location within a vertical array. The words were either ungrouped or grouped into 2 sets of 9, with each set divided into 3 subsets. In Experiment 1, grouping aided the learning of spatial arrangement but not temporal sequence. In Experiment 2, learning was made more difficult for half of the participants by increasing the rate of word presentation, but grouping did not affect the learning of temporal order information in either difficulty condition. In Experiment 3, phonological processing was blocked by articulatory suppression for half of the participants, but grouping still did not affect learning temporal order. It is concluded that participants take advantage of grouping to learn spatial but not temporal information, thereby challenging unitary accounts of learning order information.