Colin MacLeod

Distinguished Professor Emeritus
Colin MacLeod

BA (McGill University)

PhD (University of Washington)

Contact information

Fellow, Royal Society of Canada

Fellow, Canadian Psychological Association

Fellow, American Psychological Association (Divisions 1 and 3)

Fellow, Association for Psychological Science

Fellow, The Psychonomic Society

Recipient, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2017 Outstanding Performance Award

Memory, Attention and Cognition Lab (MACL)

Graduate Program in Cognitive Psychology at UWaterloo

PsychSoc’s ‘The Professor Network’ Interview

Research interests

Throughout my career, my research has emphasized the broad domain of human cognition, with particular focus on attention, learning, and memory. Initially, my work was in the area of verbal learning and memory, with emphasis on long-term memory structure and process, and especially in intentional forgetting, a topic which I have continued to study. Subsequently, I also became interested in individual differences in cognition, highlighting how people differ in their linguistic and spatial skills and strategies. Some of this work revolved around basic processes involved in reading. These domains then led me to a continuing interest in the area of attention. Primarily, this research has concerned the development of skill (automaticity) through learning/practice, particularly using the Stroop colour-word interference measure as a model task. More recently, my memory research has emphasized the role of consciousness in memory and the distinction between indirect tests of memory (implicit measures that do not require conscious awareness) and direct tests of memory (explicit measures that do require conscious awareness). Most recently, my lab has been exploring the production effect—that having said things out loud helps in remembering them—and contingency learning—developing implicit associations between relevant and irrelevant information.  I continue to be fascinated by the interplay between attention and memory, and the role that learning plays in that interaction.

Selected publications (last 5 years)

(Note: These and all other publications are available for download as PDFs from my lab website; see the link above.)

  • Besner, D., & MacLeod, C. M. (2024). On the association between intention and visual word recognition. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 78(2), 114-128.

  • Roberts, B. R. T., Hu, Z. S., Curtis, E., Bodner, G. E., McLean, D., & MacLeod, C. M. (2024). Reading text aloud benefits memory but not comprehension.  Memory & Cognition, 52(1), 57-72.

  • Roberts, B. R. T., Forrin, N. D., McLean, D., & MacLeod, C. M. (2024). Release from response interference in color-word contingency learning. Acta Psychologica, 244, 104187.

  • Kelly, M. O., Ensor, T. M., MacLeod, C. M., & Risko, E. F. (2024). The prod eff:  Partially producing items moderates the production effect. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 31(1), 373-379.

  • MacLeod, C. M. (2023). Edwina Eunice Abbott (Cowan):  Pioneer psychologist.  American Journal of Psychology, 136(3), 315-326.  

  • Roberts, B. R. T., MacLeod, C. M., & Fernandes, M. A. (2023). Memory for symbolic images: Findings from sports team logos.  Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 12(4), 598-596.

  • Roberts, B. R. T., MacLeod, C. M., & Fernandes, M. A. (2023). Symbol superiority: Why $ is better remembered than ‘dollar.’  Cognition, 238, 105435.

  • Kalsi, S. S., Forrin, N. D., Sana, F., MacLeod, C. M., & Kim, J. A. (2023).  Attention contagion online:  Attention spreads between students in a virtual classroom.  Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 12(1), 59-69.

  • Roberts, B. R. T., MacLeod, C. M., & Fernandes, M. A. (2022). The enactment effect: An integrative review of behavioral, neuroimaging, and patient studies.  Psychological Bulletin, 148(5-6), 397-434.

  • Tanberg, P., Fernandes, M. A., & MacLeod, C. M. (2022). Aging and directed forgetting: Evidence for an associative deficit but no evidence for an inhibition deficit.  Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 76(3), 210-217.

  • Zhou, Y., & MacLeod, C. M. (2022). Production as a distinctive contextual cue for remembering intentionally forgotten information.  Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 76(3), 226-233.

  • MacLeod, C. M., Ozubko, J. D., Hourihan, K. L., & Major, J. C. (2022). The production effect is consistent over material variations: Support for the distinctiveness account.  Memory, 30(8), 1000-1007.

  • Kelly, M. O., Ensor, T. M., Lu, X., MacLeod, C. M., & Risko, E. F. (2022). Reducing retrieval time modulates the production effect: Empirical evidence and computational accounts.  Journal of Memory and Language, 123, 104299.

  • MacLeod, C. M. (2021). Canadian Journal of (Experimental) Psychology:  The first 70 years.  Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 75(4), 393-402.

  • Zhou, Y., & MacLeod, C. M. (2021).  Production between and within:  Distinctiveness and the relative magnitude of the production effect.  Memory, 29(2), 168-179.

  • Ozubko, J. D., Sirianni, L. A., Ahmad, F. N., MacLeod, C. M., & Addante, R. J. (2021).  Recallable but not recognizable: The influence of semantic priming in recall paradigms. Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Neuroscience, 21(1), 119-143.

  • Forrin, N. D., Huynh, A. C., Smith, A. C., Cyr, E. N., McLean, D. B., Siklos-Whillans, J., Risko, E. F., Smilek, D., & MacLeod, C. M. (2021). Attention spreads between students in a learning environment.  Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 27(2), 276-291.

  • MacLeod, C. M. (2021). Memory & Cognition:  The first 40 years.  Memory & Cognition, 49(2), 207-217.

  • MacLeod, C. M. (2020). The butcher on the bus:  A note on familiarity without recollection.  History of Psychology, 23(4), 383-387.

  • MacLeod, C. M.  (2020).  Zeigarnik and von Restorff:  The memory effects and the stories behind them.   Memory & Cognition, 48(6), 1073-1088.

  • Pritchard, V. E., Heron-Delaney, M., Malone, S. A., & MacLeod, C. M. (2020).  The production effect improves memory in 7 to 10-year-old children.  Developmental Psychology, 91(3), 901-913.

  • Roberts, B. R. T., Fernandes, M. A., & MacLeod, C. M. (2020).  Re-evaluating whether bilateral eye movements influence memory retrieval.  PLoS ONE, 15(1), e0227790.

Teaching interests

  • Introductory Psychology
  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Attention & Memory

Professional memberships

  • Psychonomic Society
  • Canadian Society for Brain, Behaviour, and Cognitive Science
  • Association for Psychological Science
  • American Psychological Association
  • Canadian Psychological Association