Coding Capacity and Duration of Memory Flashcards

1
Q

Define coding

A

The format in which information is stored in various memory stores

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2
Q

Define capacity

A

The amount of information that can be held in a memory store

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3
Q

Define Duration

A

The length of time information can be held in memory

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4
Q

Short term memory (STM)

Definition,Coding capcity and duration

A

-The limited capacity memory store.
-Coding is mainly acoustic (sounds),
-Capacity is between 5-9 items
-Duration is between 18 and 30 seconds

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5
Q

Define Long Term Memory (LTM)

A

-Known as the permanent memory store.
-Coding is mainly semantic (meaning)
-It has unlimited capacity
-Stores memories for up to a lifetime

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6
Q

Define chunking

A

When large pieces of information is divided into smaller chunks that are easier to retain in short-term memory

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7
Q

Procedure of Baddeleys research on coding

This study proves that information is coded semantically in LTM

A

*Baddeley (1966)-Gave different lists of words to four groups of participants to remember

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8
Q

What were the 4 groups of particpants Alan Baddeley used

A

Group 1- Acoustically similar -words sound similar-
Group 2- Acoustically dissimilar
Group 3- Semantically similar -words with similar meanings-
Group 4- Semantically dissimilar

only one of those groups needs mentioning in a 16 marker

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9
Q

Findings of Alan Baddeley (1966) research on coding (5)

A

*Ppts were then shown the original words and asked to recall them in the correct order
*When they were asking to recall it after hearing the words (STM recall), they tended to do worse with acoustically similar words
-Suggesting that information is coded acoustically in STM
*If participants were asked to recall the words after a time interval of 20 mins (LTM recall), They did worse with the semantically similar words.
*This suggests information is coded semantically in LTM

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10
Q

Research on capacity- Joseph Jacobs (1887)Procedure (3)

A

*He developed a technique to measure digit span.
*The researcher gives for example, 4 digits and then the participant is asked to recall these in the correct order out loud.
*If this is correct the researcher reads out 5 digits and so on until the participant cannot recall the order correctly.

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11
Q

Findings of Joseph Jacobs (1887)

A

-The mean span for digits across all ppts was 9.3 items
-The mean span for letters was 7.3

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12
Q

Research on capacity- Span of memory and chunking- (5)

The guy obsessed with 7s

A

-George Miller (1956)
*He made observations of everyday practice.
-For example he noted that things come in sevens: there are 7 notes on the musical scale, 7 days of the week, 7 deadly sins and so on.
*This suggests that the span (or capacity) of STM is about 7 items (plus or minus 2).
*Miller also noticed that people can recall 5 words as well as 5 letters and they do this by chunking-

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13
Q

Research on Duration-Duration of STM (8)

Shows that the duration of STM is short

A
  • Peterson & Peterson (1959)
  • Tested 24 students.
  • Each student took part in 8 trials.
  • On each trial a student was given a consonant syllable (also known as trigram, such as YCG) to remember and was also given a 3 digit number.
  • The student was then asked to count backwards from that 3 digit number until told to stop.
  • The counting backwards was to prevent any mental rehearsal.
  • On each trial they were told to stop after a different amount of time -3, 6, 9 seconds-
  • Their findings suggest that STM may have a very short duration unless it is repeated over and over again
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14
Q

Research on Duration-Duration of LTM (6)

A
  • Bahrick (1975)
  • He Studied 392 ppts aged 17-74.
  • High school yearbooks were obtained from the ppts or directly from some schools.
  • Recall was tested through photo-recognition tests which consisted of 50 photos from their high school yearbook.
  • Ppts who were tested within 15 years of graduation were about 90% accurate in photo recognition.
  • After 48 years, recall declined to about 70% for photo recognition.
    This shows that LTM can last a very long time
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