Coding, Capacity and Duration: AO3

Question 1

What are strengths of research on coding, capacity and duration?

Answer 1

• P: Strength = clear difference between the two memory stores
• E: Later research showed that there were some exeptions to Baddeley’s findings
• C: But the idea that STM uses mostly acoustic coding and LTM uses mostly semantic coding has stood the test of time
• L: This is an important step in the understanding of the memory system which led to the MSM
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• P: Strength = Jacob’s study has been replicated
• E: Study is very old and early research lacked adequate controls e.g some PPs digit spans might have been underestimated because they were distracted during testing (confounding variable)
• E: However, it has been confirmed by otheer better controlled studies (Bopp & Verhaeghen (2005))
• L: Valid test of digit span in STM

Question 2

What is a limitation of research on coding, capacity and duration?

Answer 2

• P: Limitation = artificial stimuli not meaningful stimuli
• E: Word lists had no personal meaning to PPs. Baddeley’s findings may not tell us much about coding in different kinds of memory tasks
• E: When processing more meaningful information people may use semantic coding, even for STM tasks
• L: Findings have limited application