Is it possible for the choice of columns displayed in list view to be linked to the Smart Group currently selected?
For example, I have a smart group of all journal articles, for which I'd like one column to be "Journal". For a different smart group I don't need that column and can use the slot for something else, e.g. "Year".
What I mean is for this to be stored as a column set associated with the smart group so that it remembers.
No, I'm afraid that's not possible. Note that you can have up to 5 columns (3 is the default), so you can have both Year and Journal displayed, and refer to whichever you find more useful depending on the group selected.