cognitive psychology in paper 1 Flashcards
multi store model of memory
define capacity
- how much information this store can retain.
multi store model
define encoding
- how long this store can retain info for.
multi store model
define maintenance rehearsal.
- acoustically repeating knowledge in your head.
multi store model
define elaborative rehearsal
- the way you get information from your short term memory to your long term.
multi store model
define retrieval
- the process by which memory are acessed at a later date.
multi store model
define decay
- when learnt material fades over time unless its practiced and used.
multi store model
define displacement
- Once the memory is full, new information will replace the old one, short term memory has a limited capacity.
multi store model
define interference
- when some information makes it difficult to recall similar material.
multi store model
what is ionic memory?
sensory memory
- visual information from the eyes, stored as images.
multi store model
what is echoic memory?
sensory memory
- auditory input from the ears, stored as sounds.
multi store model
what is haptic memory?
sensory memory
- tactile input from the body, stored as feelings.
multi store model
what is sensory memory?
- when information from the environment is encoded through the senses, each one having a different store.
- i.e. haptic memory.
- information is stored for 1 sec unless we pay attention then it enters our STM.
multi store model
what is short term memory?
- a temporary store that has a capacity of 5-9 items.
- it can be held for up to 30 secs.
- information is mainly encoded acoustically, if its elaboratively rehearsed it can be transferred to the LTM.
- information can be maintained with maintence rehearsal.
- if information isnt rehearsed, it is forgotten by decay or displacement.
multi store model
what is long term memory?
- has an unlimited capacity.
- its duration is from minutues to a lifetime.
- information is mainly encoded semantically (in terms of its meaning).
- information is forgotten by decay or interference.
multi store model
what is a stregnth of this model?
- there is evidence from case studies of people with brain damage that supports the distinction between STM and LTM.
- Clive Wearing still rememebered his wife but not the things she just said.
- demonstrating to exsistence of seperate STM and LTM stores, damage of the STM prevents the transfer of information to the LTM.
multi store model
what is weakness of this model?
- the description of the STM may be to simplistic.
- dual task experiments show that we perform poorly when trying to complete two similar tasks at the same time, but that we perfom well when doing two tasks of a different nature. This cant be explained by the MSM.
- therefore working memory model may be a better explantion as it explains dual task performace and is seen as a more dynamic model of STM.
working memory model
what does the model explain?
- how information is temporarily stored and manipulated.
working memory model
what is the central executive?
- an attentional process that has a supervisory role, it focuses and divides and switches our limited attention.
- its able to briefly process different forms of information, i.e. acoustic, visual
- it allocates slave sub systems tasks.
- it has a very limited processing capacity and doesnt store information.
working memory model
what is the phonological loop?
- a slave system which temporarily stores verbal information
- it encodes acoustically.
- its divided into the articulatory process and the phonological store.
working memory model
what is the articulatory process?
- A process that allows maintence rehearsal.
- it has a capacity of 2 seconds.
- i.e. repeating a phone number in your head while you look for a pen.
working memory model
what is the phonological store?
- a store which stores auditory information.
- i.e. you’ll be able to hold auditory memory of your teachers last sentence when they dictate notes to you in class to write down.
working memory model
what is the visuospatial sketchpad?
- can temporarily store visual or spatial information.
- i.e. can visualise a map of the route when asked.
- has a limited capacity of 3 to 4 objects.
- can be subdived into the visual cache and the inner scribe.
working memory model
what is the visual cache?
- it briefly stores visual data including shape and form of 2D objects.
working memory model
what is the inner scribe?
- it briefly records the arrangement of objects in the visual field (3D).
- i.e. mental picture of a diagram before drawing it.
working memory model
what is the episodic buffer?
- A temporary store that integrates the acoustic, visual and spatial information processed by other subsystems.
- it also maintains a sense of time sequencing (recording events).
- has a limited capacity of 4 chunks.
- it combines other subsytems and LTM.
- I.e. visualising ur house and counting the number of windows in your head.
working memory model
what is a stregnth of this model?
- theres evidence fom case studies of brain damage patients also support the idea of separate short term memory stores.
- an example being shallice and warrington (1974) who reported the case of KF who suffered STM impairment following a motorbike. KF had a digit span of 1, suggesting a gross impairment in his phonological store, but his visual memory was intact.
- Therefore supporting the proposal that working memory has 2 subsytems to deal with verbal and visualspatial information relatively independently.
working memory model
what is a weakness of this model?
- there are problems in specifying the precise functioning of the centeral executive.
- Elisinger & Damasio (1985) describe a case study of a man with brain damage resulting from the removal of a brain tumour. His reasoning was good, his IQ was high and he coped well with interference during memory tasks, indicating tht his CE was working fine.However, his decision making was poor.
- if the CE was a single system we would expect none of these abilities to be affected therefore implying that the CE is not a single system.
long term memory model
what did Tulving propose with this model?
- LTM could be divided into episodic memory (remebered experiences) and semantic memory (remebered facts).
- These stores were different in the way they stored memories, i.e. time referencing.
long term memory model
what is episodic memory in the nature of memory?
- a mental diary which stores memories in an autobiographical way linked to time and context of an individuals life.
- i.e. if you’ve been to south africa in the summer you’ll know its hot bc you’ll remember the sun shining etc.
long term memory model
what is semantic memory in the nature of memory?
- a mental encylopaedia storing words, facts, rules, meaning and concepts as an organised body of knowledge.
- the memories are associated with other facts that link the concepts togther like school and learning.
- i.e. if you’ve never been to south africa in the summer but u know its hot your using semantic storage.
long term memory model
what is episodic memory in time referencing?
- memories of events that have happened to you are linked to the time in which they occured.
- i.e. remebering ur first day of school will be linked to the date this occured, you’ll remember how old u were & who ur teacher was etc.
long term memory model
what is semantic memory in time referencing?
- is detached from any temporal link and u can recall this information without referencing to when it was learned.
- i.e. can recall that adjectives describe a noun without remembering where u learnt it.
long term memory model
what is episodic memory in spatial referencing?
- input into episodic memory is continuous as we experience a whole episode in one temporal frame of reference.
- i.e. memories of a birthday party contains experiences over a period of time and within a time frame, it cant be later added to.
long term memory model
what is semantic memory in spatial referencing?
- memory input in a fragmented way, we can piece together factual information which has been learned at different times.
long term memory model
what is episodic memory in retrieval?
- recall is dependant on the context in which the event was learnt or experienced.
- i.e. info can be easily be recalled in the same setting.
- lack of cues can lead to forgetting.
- its more autobiographical and is susceptible to transformation (change).
long term memory model
what is semantic memory in retrieval?
- recall isnt dependent on context of learning, its based on inferences, generalisation and logical thought.
- making it unlikely to be forgotten, dont need cues.