Background. Classical psychology has considered forgetting as a negative process of failure of memorization and extraction, but did not deem it a separate mental process with specific features. The pioneer studies of intentional forgetting were conducted only in the late 1960s. Therefore, it seems to us relevant to present an analysis of the research methods that have been used to study purposeful forgetting.

The Objective is to analyze thoroughly intentional forgetting in modern cognitive psychology and to justify the assumption that the productive development of intentional forgetting issues should be associated with the priority attention to the regulating function of the mnemonic goal and its structure. A hypothesis lies in the fact that a particular operation of the mnemonic action of forgetting consists in disconnecting the content links between the constituent mnemonic elements made during memorizing process.

Design. Two of the most common experimental procedures for inducing the effect of reducing the reproduction of stimulus material after the "Forget" instruction are described: the item method and the list method. The results show four ways of interpreting the intentional forgetting effect: the aspirations of the subjects to meet the experimenter's expectations, selective encoding and selective processing of the material presented, the mechanism of active "retrieval inhibition" and eliminating the mnemonic trace. The concept of mnemonic action introduced in the works of P.I. Zinchenko and the concept of the mnemonic scheme as a program for the subsequent reproduction of V.Ya. Lyaudis are considered.

The Research Results suggest that when trying to perform an inadequate mnemonic query, the subject is forced to implement an additional operation, which may be attributed to potential forgetting operations. The development of this hypothesis consists in the theoretical description of operations that destroy the existing mnemonic scheme, followed by an empirical test of their amnesogenic effectiveness. Such an approach can be used in further studies of intentional forgetting.

Conclusion. Encoding and processing of mnemonic material, extraction, and the mechanism for inhibited reproduction play a role in shaping the effect of intentional forgetting. Considering the fact that the mnemonic trace can fade over time or for other reasons, forgetting is deemed as a multifaceted process. Prospects for the development of this subject area should be conducted using the mnemonic construct.

The paper focuses on the phenomenon of forgetting as a primal and generally productive memory process. The cases that require temporary and permanent forgetting of the data stored in the long-term memory are contrasted. The main methodological obstacle in forgetting research is identified as arising from the logical prohibition to argument from the negative, i.e. “the evidence of absence is not the evidence of absence”. Two mechanisms of forgetting are discussed in the paper: transformation of the memory trace and modulation of trace accessibility. The former mechanism of forgetting consists of memory trace destruction (memory trace decay, retroactive and proactive interference, and «catastrophic» interference) or its transformation that leads to forming a new memory representation. The most promising way to legitimize the trace destruction mechanism is narrowing the further research to episodic memory subsystem. The latter mechanism of forgetting consists of both passive failure in access to appropriate memory content (the tip of the tongue phenomenon, the category size effect, the fan effect) and the process of active retrieval inhibition. This phenomenon represents temporary inhibition of competing semantically similar responses in semantic memory, and motivational inhibition of self-deprecating memories in autobiographical memory. Thus, a variety of experimental paradigms in intentional forgetting research are considered. Contrary to the common claim that forgetting is а universal and homogeneous phenomenon, we propose that forgetting strategies might vary in different memory subsystems, and also depend on activity characteristics during encoding, storage and retrieval.

The paper focuses on the phenomenon of forgetting as a primal and generally productive memory process. The cases that require a temporary and permanent forgetting of the material stored in the long-term memory are contrasted. The main methodological obstacle in forgetting research is identified as arising from the logical prohibition to argument from the negative, i.e. “the evidence of absence is not the evidence of absence”. Two mechanisms of forgetting are discussed in the paper: transformation of the memory trace and modulation of trace accessibility. The former mechanism of forgetting consists of memory trace destruction (memory trace decay, retroactive and proactive interference, and «catastrophic» interference) or its transformation that leads to forming a new memory representation. We speculate that the most promising way to legitimize the trace destruction mechanism is narrowing the further research to episodic memory subsystem. The latter mechanism of forgetting consists of both passive failure in access to appropriate memory content (the tip of the tongue phenomenon, the category size effect, the fan effect) and the process of active retrieval inhibition. This phenomenon represents temporary inhibition of competing semantically similar responses in semantic memory, and motivational inhibition of self-deprecating memories in autobiographical memory. Then we put into consideration a variety of experimental paradigms in intentional forgetting research. Contrary to the common claim that forgetting is а universal and homogeneous phenomenon, we propose that forgetting strategies might vary in different memory subsystems, and also depend on activity characteristics during encoding, storage and retrieval.