2.1.1 - WMM

Question 1

Draw the WMM

Answer 1

Question 2

AO1 x 3

Answer 2

• The central executive directs attention to tasks and determines how resources are allocated to the slave systems
• the phonological loop consists of the phonological store which holds words that are heard and the articulatory process which holds words that us heard/seen and silently repeated
• the visual spatial sketch pad store’s visual information which is what things look like and spatial information which is the relationship between things

Question 3

AO3 x 2

strengths

Answer 3

• Model is supported by the case study KF who experienced amnesia after a brain injury. He had poor short term memory for auditory information but could process visual information normally eg immediate recall was stronger when he read words than if they were read to him. Therefore the phonological loop was damaged but Visio-spatial sketch pad was intact, supporting that there are separate stores in short term memory suggested by the working memory model
• Dual task studies eg Hitch and Baddeley found participant performance significantly decreased when both tasks utilised the same slave system compared to tasks requiring both the phonological loop and the visuospatial sketch pad. Therefore this supports the idea of there being multiple and separate components within the short term memory, as suggested by the working memory model

Question 4

AO3 x 2

weaknesses

Answer 4

• The central executive is an unsatisfactory component which isn’t well explained or defined. Baddeley recognised this when he wrote, ‘the central executive is the most important but least understood component of working memory’. Therefore the working memory model has not been fully explained as the central needs to be more clearly specified than just being, paying attention to incoming sensory information as the theory is oversimplified
• only focused on short term memory and no information on the sensory register and encoding information to long term memory. Therefore it’s not a complete model of memory and it’s limited in its application to everyday human memory as it doesn’t explain how information arrives in working memory and how information is stored in the long term.