Classic study - Baddeley (1966)

Question 1

BACKGROUND:

Previous studies into STM have shown that…

Answer 1

when words are acoustically similar, recall is negatively affected (more so than when words were semantically similar)

Question 2

BACKGROUND:

STM lasts for…

Answer 2

less than one minute

Question 3

BACKGROUND:

LTM lasts for…

Answer 3

potentially forever

Question 4

BACKGROUND:

What affects recall in both STM and LTM?

Answer 4

interference

Question 5

AIMS

Answer 5

1. To see if in LTM acoustic similarity of words would lead to more memory impairment than would semantic similarity of words.
2. To investigate the encoding of STM and LTM.

Question 6

METHOD:

Research method

Answer 6

lab experiment

Question 7

METHOD:

Participant design

Answer 7

independent measures

Question 8

METHOD:

Sampling method

Answer 8

opportunity sampling

Question 9

METHOD:

Independent variable

Answer 9

word lists; acoustically similar/dissimilar, semantically similar/dissimilar

Question 10

METHOD:

Dependent variable

Answer 10

number of words recorded in the correct order

Question 11

METHOD:

Sample

Answer 11

> males and females selected from ‘The Applied Psychology Research Unit’

> approx. 20 Ps per group

Question 12

PROCEDURE:

Condition A

Answer 12

Acoustic similarity:

Ps learned a list of 10 acoustically similar words

(man, cab, can, cad, cap, mad, max, mat, cat, map)

Question 13

PROCEDURE:

Condition B

Answer 13

Acoustic dissimilarity (control):

Ps learned a list of 10 acoustically relatively dissimilar words, which were matched with list A in terms of frequency of use

(pit, few, cow, pen, sup, bar, day, hot, rig, bun)

Question 14

PROCEDURE:

Condition C

Answer 14

Semantic similarity:

Ps learned a list of 10 semantically similar adjectives

(great, large, big, huge, broad, long, tall, fat, wide, high)

Question 15

PROCEDURE:

Condition D

Answer 15

Semantic dissimilarity (control):

Ps learned a list of 10 semantically dissimilar adjectives, matched with list C for frequency of use

(good, huge, hot same, thin, deep, strongest, foul, old, late)

Question 16

PROCEDURE:

Step by step

Answer 16

1. Each list was presented - 1 word every 3 seconds in the correct order
2. Ps completed 6 tasks involving memory for digits - they recalled the word list in 1 minute by writing down the sequence in order - this was repeated over 4 trials
3. The groups were given a 15 minute interference task involving copying 8 digit sequences at their own pace
4. Ps were given a surprise retest on the word sequence

Question 17

RESULTS:

Acoustically similar list

Answer 17

no significant difference from the trials to the retest

Question 18

RESULTS:

Semantically similar list

Answer 18

scores in the control group were higher

Question 19

RESULTS:

Comparison between recall of acoustically similar and dissimilar words

Answer 19

Recall of acoustically similar sounding words was worse than the dissimilar sounding words during the initial phase of learning (particularly in trial 2)

However this was not statistically significant therefore encoding was initially difficult but didn’t affect long term memory recall

Question 20

RESULTS:

Comparison between recall of semantically similar and dissimilar words

Answer 20

Ps found the semantically similar words harder to learn than the semantically dissimilar words and recalled significantly fewer semantically similar words in the retest

Question 21

CONCLUSIONS:

The fact that Ps found it harder to recall list one in the initial phase of learning suggests that…

Answer 21

STM is largely acoustic, therefore acoustically similar words were harder to encode

Question 22

CONCLUSIONS:

Retest really of list three, four and during retest was impaired in the semantically similar list, suggesting that…

Answer 22

encoding in the LTM is largely semantic

Question 23

CONCLUSIONS:

Overall conclusion

Answer 23

The study demonstrates how STM and LTM are affected differently by different types of encoding