The Serial Position Effect: A Review of the Literature

The Serial Position Effect is a psychological phenomenon where people tend to remember the first and last items in a list better than those in the middle. Research shows that when recalling lists—such as words or numbers—primacy effect helps with remembering early items, while recency effect helps with recent ones. This pattern occurs because early items are transferred to long-term memory, and the latest items are still active in short-term memory. Understanding this effect helps improve strategies for learning and memory, emphasizing the importance of repetition and review to enhance retention of the middle items.