Lecture 2 - Short & Long-Term Memory Flashcards
Freud suggested that memory had 2 layers, what are these?
Surface (transitory) and Deep (permanent)
William James suggested 2 types of memory, what are they?
Primary (stream of consciousness) and Secondary Memory
There are thought to be 3 basic memory systems, what are these?
Sensory Memory
Short term/Working memory
Long-term memory
What are the general characteristics of sensory memory?
Large capacity
Literal record of perceptual experience
Lost quickly (transient)
What is iconic memory and what are its characteristics?
Iconic memory: visual memory
- Holds visual input for about 250msec
- Representation is pre-categorical - has not been categorised as meaning anything yet - purely what something looks like
What is echoic memory and what are its characteristics?
Echoic memory: auditory memory
- Holds visual input for 2-3 seconds
- Thought to be less transient than iconic memory
Describe Sperling’s (1960) Iconic Memory Research
- Flash a matrix of letters and digits for 50msec
- Identify as many items as possible
- P’s typically remembered 4 items
What is ‘The Free Recall Task’?
- Present P’s with a list of words
- P’s to recall them in any order
- Plot the results according to how well the words were recalled at each serial position
What are the reasons behind the Primacy & Recency gradients from free recall tasks?
Primacy - First few items can be rehearsed a lot and so more likely to move into LTM
Recency - Last few items of list are still in STM
Describe the purpose of a free recall task including a filled delay
To reduce the recency effects
What are P’s required to do during a filled delay?
Complete a simple secondary task (e.g., counting backwards)
What’s the capacity of STM as per George Miller (1956)?
From a digit span test, the magic number is 7+/- 2, however Cowan (2000) found it is more likely to be 4+/- 1
What type of coding is believed to be used for STM?
STM is thought to be basic on a phonological (sounds) code and is believed to be like one’s ‘inner voice’
What is the Phonological Similarity Effect?
- Words that ‘sound’ alike more poorly recalled than dissimilar sounding words
- Therefore, if you are presented with semantically similar/different words, there will be no impact on memory
What is the Word Length Effect?
Recall of words is worse for longer words than for shorter words
How can the word length effect eliminated?
If phonological coding is prevented through ‘articulatory suppression’ (e.g., repeating an irrelevant word)
What is the modal model of memory (Atkinson & Shiffrin, 1968)
Stimuli - Sensory Stores - STM - LTM
Outline Standing’s (1973) “Learning 10,000 pictures”
- P’s could recognise 133/160 pictures selected randomly from about 10,000 pictures studied earlier
- Therefore, must have had a LTM trace of ~6,600 pictures
Why are pictures better recognised than words?
You have both a visual representation and a verbal semantic representation of it so acts as a dual coding system
Outline Paivio’s (1969) Dual Coding Hypothesis
Words that are imageable can be encoded in both visual and verbal forms so are remembered better
What is explicit vs implicit memory?
Explicit: when retrieval of a memory is deliberate/involves conscious recollection
Implicit: When behaviour indicates that memories are being retrieved in the absence of a conscious attempt to retrieve them (e.g., procedural memory)
What is episodic vs semantic memory?
Episodic - Memories for events/experiences
Semantic - General knowledge about the world
What is the evidence for the hierarchical structure of semantic memory?
Speed of responding to Q’s about semantic concepts differs according to number of ‘vertical’ steps required through the network (Collins & Quillian, 1969)
