However, the validity of using this particular paradigm has been questioned. By the 1950s, this technique was used to demonstrate an effect of contextual information on memory recall. Such non-significant results encouraged the development of new methods, such as a retroactive interference paradigm, to analyze the effect of context on memory. These early studies were unable to demonstrate an effect of context-dependent memory. Research on this topic was conducted by researchers in the 1930s who analyzed how changes in context affect an individual's memory for nonsense syllables. Research has also shown that context-dependence may play an important role in numerous situations, such as memory for studied material, or events that have occurred following the consumption of alcohol or other drugs. However, the research literature on context-dependent memory describes a number of different types of contextual information that may affect recall such as environmental context-dependent memory, state-dependent learning, cognitive context-dependent memory and mood-congruent memory. This example best describes the concept of context-dependent forgetting. This concept is heavily related to the encoding specificity principle. Based on the role that context plays in determining recall, it is not at all surprising that individuals often quite easily discover the lost item upon returning to the correct context. Typically, people try to systematically 'retrace their steps' to determine all of the possible places where the item might be located. One particularly common example of context-dependence at work occurs when an individual has lost an item (e.g. In a simpler manner, 'when events are represented in memory, contextual information is stored along with memory targets the context can therefore cue memories containing that contextual information'. In psychology, context-dependent memory is the improved recall of specific episodes or information when the context present at encoding and retrieval are the same. Improved recall when the context of a situation is the same

Encoding specificity principle a b