The weather forecast under the weather

Abstract

The weather forecast as broadcast several times a day, appears to be too long for effective storage in human memory. Out of 12 to 32 items per message a maximum of seven (±2) were reproduced. Selective listening to parts of the message reduced the number of correctly recalled items to about five. Addition of a long-term weather forecast has the same interfering effect as increase of listlength. The results are discussed on the basis of the observation that weather forecasts are processed in the same way as nonsense materials are. Improvement of the situation might be obtained by making weather forecasts more meaningful.