SERIAL POSITION EFFECT: A CASE STUDY AMONG PRIMARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

The serial position effect is an important phenomenon in student learning whereby learners tend to remember information at the beginning and end of a list than those at the middle. More empirical studies are needed to ascertain whether this phenomenon is applicable and true for all learners. This case study aims to examine whether Primary 1 students at a Primary school experience the serial position effect phenomenon when recalling lists of English words. For this purpose, five Primary 1 students from a primary school in Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia were selected for this case study. In the experiment, three sets of English word lists (with 14 words for each list) were used as the main instrument for the data collection in the memory recalling process. The experiment was conducted following five steps as determined by the researcher. The findings revealed that the participants demonstrated the primary and middle effects, partially in contrast with the standard serial position effect theory. The present study has ascertained that the serial position effect theory is not fully true and applicable for the subjects of this study. This case study has some pedagogical implications to teachers, and recommendations for future research were proposed.