Does enactment truly boost action memory? Investigating action memory through dynamic action videos.

Abstract

The significance of acquiring motor skills for daily activities and professional tasks is universally acknowledged. Two experiments were conducted to explore the impact of Self-Performed Task (SPT) and Experimenter-Performed Task (EPT) during both encoding and retrieval on the memory of dynamic sequential actions presented in videos. The first experiment, involving 48 participants, determined that SPT-encoding was more effective than EPT-encoding. The second experiment, with 60 participants, revealed a significant interaction between the encoding mode and the recognition mode. Notably, when with EPT-encoding, there was a significant difference in memory precision between the two recognition methods, with the EPT-recognition yielding better memory outcomes than the SPT-recognition. However, there was no significant difference in memory performance between the two recognition methods under the SPT-encoding conditions. Collectively, the findings of these experiments confirm the persistence of the enactment effect in the memory of dynamic and continuous actions, with some results also offering empirical support for both the two-component hypothesis and action encoding theory.