4.1.2 memory

Question 1

multi-store model

Answer 1

Devised by Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968).
Is the first cognitive explanation of memory; previously had mainly tried to study and explain memory through biological measures
the model explains how information flows through a series of storage systems, with 3 permanent structures: SR, STM, and LTM. Each stage differs in terms of:
coding
capacity
duration
Information gathered by the sense organs enters the sensory register. Only the small amount paid attention to, passes to short-term memory for further processing, the rest is lost very quickly.Information in STM that is actively processed enough, mainly through rehearsal, transfers to LTM for permanent storage.

Question 2

short term memory

Answer 2

Short-term memory
Temporarily stores information received by the SR and is an active changing memory system as it contains information being thought about.
Maintenance rehearsal is the process of verbally or mentally repeating information, which allows the duration of short-term memory to be extended beyond 30 seconds.
Capacity:
7 +/- 2 items
Can be increased by chunking (sizes of units of information in storage is increased by being given a collective meaning)
Duration:
A maximum of 30 seconds.
Can be extended by rehearsal
Coding
Arrives in original raw form, such as sound/vision
Mainly auditory

Question 3

long term memory

Answer 3

If information is given meaning (elaborative rehearsal) it is passed onto the LTM. 
Elaborative rehearsal is the process of linking new information in a meaningful way with information already stored in LTM. More effective than maintenance rehearsal as it helps ensure new information is encoded well. 
Capacity: 
Unlimited  
Duration: 
Unlimited 
Coding: 
Mainly semantic 
Can be visual and auditory

Question 4

sensory memory or register

Answer 4

Information arrives from the senses. Is not under cognitive control and is an automatic response to the reception of sensory information by the sense organs. 
Capacity: 
All sensory experiences. 
Large capacity 
Data contained is unprocessed data that is detailed and ever changing. 
Duration: 
¼ to ½ second 
The duration of each type of information decays at a different rate. 
Coding: 
Sense specific 
Echoic for sound 
Iconic for visual 
Haptic for tactile information 
Gustatory for taste 
Olfactory for smell

Question 5

types of long term memory

Answer 5

Information arrives from the senses. Is not under cognitive control and is an automatic response to the reception of sensory information by the sense organs. 
Capacity: 
All sensory experiences. 
Large capacity 
Data contained is unprocessed data that is detailed and ever changing. 
Duration: 
¼ to ½ second 
The duration of each type of information decays at a different rate. 
Coding: 
Sense specific 
Echoic for sound 
Iconic for visual 
Haptic for tactile information 
Gustatory for taste 
Olfactory for smell

Question 6

working memory model

Answer 6

Baddeley and Hitch (1974) questioned the existence of a single STM store and saw it as an ‘active store’, holding pieces of information while they are being worked on.
Proposed a multi-component model consisting of 3 components.

Question 7

working memory model

Answer 7

Baddeley and Hitch (1974) questioned the existence of a single STM store and saw it as an ‘active store’, holding pieces of information while they are being worked on.
Proposed a multi-component model consisting of 3 components.

Question 8

central executive

Answer 8

Acts as a filter to determine which information received by the sense organs isn’t attended to.
Drives the whole system and allocates data to the subsystems.
Deals with cognitive tasks such as mental arithmetic and problem-solving.
Only attends to 1 piece of information at a time due to its limited capacity.
Allows us to switch attention between different inputs of information.

Question 9

phonological loop

Answer 9

Deals with spoken and written material.
Is subdivided into the phonological store and the articulatory process.
Phonological store- (inner ear) processes speech perception and stores spoken words we hear for 1-2 seconds.
Articulatory control process- (inner voice) processes speech production and rehearses and stores verbal information from the phonological store.

Question 10

visuo-spatial sketchpad

Answer 10

Stores and processes information in a visual or spatial form.
Used for navigation and interaction with the physical environment, with information being coded and rehearsed using mental pictures.
Is a temporary store for visual and spatial items and the relationships between them( what items are and where they’re located)
Displays and manipulates visual and spatial information held in LTM

Question 11

episodic buffer

Answer 11

Baddeley (2000) added a 3rd slave system, the episodic buffer was added as the model needs a general store to operate
Was introduced to explain how it is possible to temporarily store information combined together from the CE, PL, VSS and LTM

Question 12

interference

Answer 12

One memory disturbs the ability to recall another. This might result in forgetting or distorting one or the other or both. This is more likely to happen if memories are similar
Proactive interference- forgetting because 1 memory blocks another causing one or both memories to be distorted or forgotten. 
Retroactive interference- forgetting occurs when newer memories disrupt the recall of older memories already stored. The degree of forgetting is again greater when the memories are similar. 
The memories may be gone to an extent but not fully gone as a trigger may make you remember them, so they are just out of reach. They could be fully gone from memory as it could be changed and another memory overrides the original. 

Question 13

cue dependent forgetting

Answer 13

CDF occurs when information in the LTM cannot be accessed. 
Recall is dependent upon retrieval cues
Retrieval cues are the prompts under which the information is stored. The fewer the numbers associated with it , the more effective the cue. 
Tulving - Explained retrieval cues as the encoding specificity principle. This is where recall is hindered due to the context of the recall being different to the time of coding 

Question 14

context dependent failiure

Answer 14

Occurs with the external retrieval cues forgetting occurs when the external environment is different to the time of coding. Thus the external difference impacts of recall 
Abernethy ( 1940) found that when subjects were tested on learnt information, by an unfamiliar teacher in an unfamiliar room they did less well, than subjects tested in a familiar room by a familiar teacher. 
Godden and Baddeley They asked divers to learn information on either dry land or underwater 
They found information learnt underwater and tested underwater, the subjects did well and vice versa when learnt and tested on dry land. However, when the context of the testing environment changed, the participants’ results were worse.

Question 15

state dependent failiure

Answer 15

This occurs when the internal environment of a participant is dissimilar to a time when the information was coded 
Overton’s research in 1972 when participants were tasked with learning information either when drunk or sober. It was found that when recalling information learnt when drunk, this was best retrieved when drunk and vice versa for the information learnt sober. Therefore concluding that state-dependent failure is an explanation for forgetting. 
A similar experiment was used with marijuana and money by Darley et al ( 1973). This concluded a further explanation for state-dependent failure. 

Question 16

repression

Answer 16

Motivated form of forgetting due to emotionally threatening events. E.g. trauma from things like car crashes. Childhood trauma. Peer pressure especially in childhood. Getting burnt. PTSD
Believed that thoughts are banished to the unconscious mind 
This is to prevent feeling of anxiety. 
Difficult to retrieve, however, will still have an impact on the conscious thoughts, emotions, desires and actions ( think physical responses).  Eg panic attacks, feelings of unsafety. 
False memory syndrome- this phenomenon, some believed caused by therapist interventions. Where recall has been suggested. Controversial area of research and practise. 

Question 17

displacement

Answer 17

DT sees information as being lost from STM as it has a limited capacity and so new information displaces old information.
Wauugh and Norman (1965) found that if a number ( called the probe) from a list of numbers occurred nearer the end of a list than the beginning, recall of the next number was better. This suggests later numbers had displaced earlier ones from the limited- capacity STM store.
Shallice (1967) used the probe technique to assess both the displacement theory and decay theory, finding forgetting was less if numbers were presented faster ( less chance for the information to decay), but also found that changing the probes position had a stronger effect ( affecting the chances for displacement to occur). This indicates that both displacement and decay causes forgetting in STM, but that displacement is more important.

Question 18

trace decay

Answer 18

Refers to a gradual fading of a memory. It assumes that memories are stored as a physical trace called an engram and that memory trace decay over time. Peterson and Peterson (1959) gave participants nonsense trigrams and found that if rehearsal of information was prevented by subtracting numbers aloud, STM of the trigrams decayed almost completely after 18 seconds. This suggests that the information was no longer in the storage line with TD.

Question 19

eyewitness testimony

Answer 19

Evidence provided by those recalling an event who were present when the event took place.
In 75% of cases where individuals had been wrongly convicted, the original guilty verdict was based on inaccurate EWT.

Question 20

influence of the schema

Answer 20

Bartlett (1932) stated that memories aren’t accurate ‘snapshots’ pf events but are ‘reconstructions’ of events, influenced by active schemas ( ready made expectations based on previous experiences, mood, existing knowledge, contexts and stereotypes).
Schemas are used to make sense of the world by ‘filling in the gaps’ in a knowledge and by simplifying the processing of information.

Question 21

influence of the schema

Answer 21

Bartlett (1932) stated that memories aren’t accurate ‘snapshots’ pf events but are ‘reconstructions’ of events, influenced by active schemas ( ready made expectations based on previous experiences, mood, existing knowledge, contexts and stereotypes).
Schemas are used to make sense of the world by ‘filling in the gaps’ in a knowledge and by simplifying the processing of information.

Question 22

factors affecting EWT- misleading information

Answer 22

Research regularly shows EWT are affected by experiences occurring after an event has occurred. A key factor is in the form of leading questions and post-event discussions.
Misleading information has been found to be more able to create false memories the more believing, emotionally arousing and subtle it is.
Leading questions increase the likelihood an individual’s schema will influence them to give a desired answer.

Question 23

factors affecting EWT- anxiety

Answer 23

A main criticism of EWT research is it usually uses artificial scenarios that have no emotional involvement for witnesses.
Real-life situations tend to have high anxiety content that can greatly affect recall.
1 area of special interest is the degree to which anxiety may divert attention away from important aspects of an event being witnessed
Loftus et al (1987) argued the ‘weapons effect’ where witnesses to violent crime focus on the weapon being used rather than the culprits face, negatively affecting the ability to recall important knowledge.

Question 24

factors affecting EWT- anxiety (IUH)

Answer 24

Deffenbacher (18983) used the Inverted-U hypothesis
( originally a description of the relationships between arousal and performance) to explain how anxiety levels affect the accuracy of recall of events experienced.
Sees moderate amounts of anxiety as improving detail and accuracy of memory recall up to an optimal point, beyond which further increases in anxiety lead to a decline in the ability to recall.

Question 25

factors affecting EWT- repression

Answer 25

Repression has been offered as an explanation of how anxiety can affect the accuracy of recall
Freud ( 1894) argued that anxiety hinders the recall of memories, as he saw forgetting as being motivated by the traumatic content of memories.

Question 26

improving EWT- cognitive interview

Answer 26

Was developed by Fisher and Geiselman (1992) and s a series of memory retrieval and communication techniques designed to improve recall in police interviews. Based on Tulving’s (1974) idea that there are several retrieval paths to a memory
2 pathways are ‘change narrative order’ and ‘change of perspective’.
Involved Tulving and Thompson’s Encoding Specificity theory ( 1973) which suggests that memory traces are made up of several features and to enhance recall, as many retrieval cues must be used.

Question 27

components of cognitive interview

Answer 27

Change of narrative order- Recall event in a different chronological order
Change of perspective- Recall event from different people’s perspective
Mental reinstatement of context- recall environment and emotional context of event
Report everything- Recall all information, even if it seems irrelevant

Question 28

improving EWT- enhanced cognitive interview

Answer 28

Fisher and Geiselman (1987) suggest an amended version of CI that seeks to build a trusting relationship between interviewer and witness and improve the quality of communication between the 2.
Important extra features:
Interviewer doesn’t distract witness with unnecessary interruptions
The witness controls the flow of conversation
Asking open-ended questions
Getting participants to speak slowly
Participants being reminded to not guess and use ‘I don’t know’, in order to avoid confabulations
Reducing anxiety in witnesses