2.2 - Models Of Memory

Question 1

Who created the multi store model ?

Answer 1

Multi store model

Question 2

What did Atkinson and shiffrin propose ?

Answer 2

Memory consists of 3 stores :

• sensory register
• short term store
• long term store

Info has to move through these stores to become a memory

Question 3

What types of information goes into the sensory register ?

Answer 3

From the environment eg. Visual and auditory

Question 4

How much capacity and duration does STM have ?

Answer 4

Finite

If information is processed further and rehearsed it can be transferred to long term memory

Question 5

Displacement

Answer 5

information will disappear if new information enters and pushed the original information due to STM limited capacity

Question 6

The primary effect - supporting study

Answer 6

• Participants are able to recall the first few items of a list better than those from the middle
• multi store model explains this because earlier items will have been rehearsed better and transferred to LTM
• rehearsal is prevented by an interfere task the effect disappears

Question 7

Recency effect - supporting study

Answer 7

• participants tend to remember the last few items better than those from the middle of the list
• as STM has limited capacity of around 7 items the words in the middle of the list if not rehearsed are displaced from STM by the last few words heard
• these words are still in the STM at the end of the experiment and can be recalled

Question 8

Korasakoffs syndrome - supporting study

Answer 8

• People with Korsakoff’s syndrome ( amnesia ) can recall the last items in a list suggesting an unaffected STM
• their LTM is very poor
• this supports the model by showing STM and LTM are different stores

Question 9

Milner et al (1957) - supporting study

Answer 9

• carried out a case study on a patient called HM who had suffered from severe and frequent epilepsy
• his seizures were based in the hippocampus
• doctors decided to surgically remove part of the brain around this area
• operation reduced his epilepsy but led him to suffer from memory loss
• he could still form short term memories but was unable to form new long term memories
• supports the idea that different types of memory are separate systems in the brain

Question 10

Limitation 1 of multi store model

Answer 10

• information is transferred from the STM to LTM through rehearsal
• in real life people don’t always spend time rehearsing yet they still transfer information into LTM
• rehearsal is not always needed for information to be stored and some items can’t be rehearsed

Question 11

Limitation 2 of multi store model

Answer 11

• model is oversimplified
• it assumes there is only one long term store and one short term store
• this has been disproved by evidence from brain damaged patients suggesting several different short term stores and other evidence suggesting different long term stores

Question 12

Who developed the multi store model ?

Answer 12

Baddeley and hitch

Question 13

What did baddeley and Hitch name it ?

Answer 13

Working memory model

Question 14

What did baddeley and Hitch propose that was different ?

Answer 14

The STM rather than being a single store is an active processor which contains several different stores

Question 15

What is the central executive described as ?

Answer 15

Attention

Question 16

What does the central executive control ?

Answer 16

Has limited capacity

Controls slave systems

Decides what working memory pays attention to

Question 17

Phonological loop

Answer 17

• Holds speech based information
• made up of phonological store ( the inner ear ) and an articulating process ( inner voice which rehearsed information by repeating it )
• limited capacity
• deals with auditory information and preserves word order

Question 18

Visuo- spatial sketch pad

Answer 18

Deals with temporary storage of visual and spatial information

Limited capacity

Stored in the inner ear

Visual= what things look like
Spatial = relationships between things

Question 19

Episodic buffer

Answer 19

• Briefly store’s information from the other subsystems and integrates it together along with information from LTM to make complete scenes or episodes
• limited capacity
• general store
• buffers information
• added in 2000

Question 20

What did baddeley and hitch base their model results from ?

Answer 20

Studies that used interference tasks

Question 21

Interference tasks

Answer 21

• if participants are asked to perform two tasks simultaneously that use the same system their performance will be affected
• according to the working model both these tasks use the phonological loop this has limited capacity so it can’t deal with both tasks - performance will be affected
• if two tasks involve different systems performance isn’t affected on either task

Question 22

Shallice & Warrington case study of KF - supporting study of the working model

Answer 22

• KF was a brain damaged patient who had an impaired STM
• problem = immediate recall of words presented verbally but not with visual information
• suggests he had an impaired articulately loop but an intact visuo-spatial sketch pad
• proposed STM was just one system

Question 23

Gathercole & Baddedley (1993) lab study - supporting study of working model

Answer 23

• participants were split into 2 groups
• all had to carry out a task where they had to follow a moving spot of light - using the visuo-spatial sketch pad
• at the same time one group of participants also had to describe the angles on a letter - another task involving the visuo-spatial sketch pad
• the other group of participants were given a second task that would use the phonological loop - they had to do a verbal task whilst following the light
• Gathercole and Baddedly found that performance was much better in the participants doing tasks which used separate systems

Question 24

Supporting evidence for working model

Answer 24

• model had less emphasis on rehearsal than the multi store model of memory
• rather than being the key process rehearsal is just one possible process in the working model
• thus this can help to explain why in real life some things end up in pit long term memory even though we haven’t rehearsed them - suggests other processes don’t work

Question 25

Limitation 1 of working memory model

Answer 25

• think baddedly and hitch idea of central executive is simplistic and vague
• model doesn’t explain exactly what the central executive is apart from being involved in attention

Question 26

Limitation 2 of working memory model

Answer 26

• Only explains how information is dealt with in short term memory
• it doesn’t explain how information is transferred into long term memory

Question 27

Limitation 3 of working model memory

Answer 27

Much of the research has supported the working memory model has been lab studies

This reduces ecological validity