classic study Baddeley (1966b)

Question 1

Describe the sample of experiment 1

Answer 1

young servicemen

originally 78 ppts but after a hearing test only 75 remained

Question 2

What was the aim of experiment 1

Answer 2

To investigate whether long term memory was like short term memory.

To investigate whether acoustically similar words in LTM would lead to more memory impairment than semantically similar words in LTM.

Question 3

Describe the lists of words used in experiment 1

Answer 3

4 lists (A, B, C, D)

List A - acoustically similar
List B - acoustically dissimilar (control)

List C - semantically similar
List D - semantically dissimilar (control)

Question 4

What group design was used in Baddeley’s studies?

Answer 4

independent groups

Question 5

Describe the procedure of experiment 1

Answer 5

• Words were presented on a tape recorder at 3 sec intervals
• ppts had 40 secs to write down as many words in the correct order
• The words were in front of them but in the wrong order
• This was repeated 4 times

Question 6

Describe the retest section used in all 3 experiments

Answer 6

• Ppts spent 20mins (15 mins for experiment 3) doing an intervening task to prevent the use of STM (8 numbers presented at 1sec intervals, 8secs to write in correct order)
• After 20 mins, ppts had to write as many words as they could remember in the correct order (words still in front of them)
• Unaware that they would have this retest

Question 7

What were the results of experiment 1

Answer 7

• Acoustically dissimilar words were better recalled than acoustically similar words
• Baddeley reported that the difference in forgetting between acoustically similar and dissimilar words as significant

-No significant difference in recall between semantically similar words and semantically dissimilar words

Question 8

What was the conclusion of experiment 1

Answer 8

Acoustic similarity led to less recall but not semantic similarity
Acoustic similarity showed almost no forgetting, but the 3 other lists did

Question 9

What was the aim of experiment 2

Answer 9

To block out the use of STM in semantically similar conditions (C) so that it matched acoustically similar conditions (A) where ppts had difficulties with STM.

Question 10

Describe the sample of experiment 2

Answer 10

Housewives from Applied Psychology Research Unit subject pannel in Cambridge

Originally 116 ppts but after hearing test only 110 remained

Question 11

Describe the lists of words used in experiment 2

Answer 11

2 lists (A, C)

List A - acoustically similar
List C - semantically similar

Question 12

What were the 3 conditions used in experiment 2

Answer 12

Condition X: Same as experiment 1 but with only list A and C

Condition Y: An interference task between the presentation of the words and the recall (x4) followed by the same 20 min intervening take and retest

Condition Z: An interference task after each recall (x4) followed by the same 20 min intervening task and retest

Question 13

What were the results of experiment 2

Answer 13

Acoustically similar words in conditions X and Y had no forgetting.

Semantically similar words had the worst recall in condition Y.
In semantically similar words, X did significantly better than Y

Question 14

What was the conclusion of experiment 2

Answer 14

Showed that the way of testing in experiment 1 did affect the learning phase because the STM was not blocked equally across all conditions.

Question 15

What was the aim of experiment 3

Answer 15

To test the original question about the role of acoustic and semantic factors in LTM, this time with the STM properly controlled for.