Memory Flashcards
Who created the MSM?
Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968)
What are the 3 stores in the MSM?
Sensory register (SR), Short-term memory (STM) and Long-term memory (LTM)
What are the 3 main stores in the SR?
- ionic register (visual)
- haptic register (touch)
- echoic register (sound)
What is the SR’s: capacity, duration, and coding?
capacity: very limited
duration: 1-2 seconds
coding: raw, unprocessed
How does information get passed on from the SR to the STM?
by paying attention
What is the STM’s: capacity, duration, and coding?
capacity: 7±2 chunks
duration: 18-20 seconds
coding: acoustic
How is information retained in the STM?
Maintenance rehearsal
How is information passed into the LTM from the STM?
Prolonged / elaborative rehearsal
What is the LTM’s: capacity, duration, and coding?
capacity: unlimited
duration: lifelong
coding: semantic
Who did an experiment to show the STM’s duration?
Peterson & Peterson
Outline Peterson & Peterson’s experiment
Participants were given a random trigram to remember, and then were told to count down from a given number in 3s to prevent rehearsal. After a given amount of time, they were told to recall the trigram they had been previously given. Each time they did this, the distraction duration would increase by 3 seconds. The results showed that once the distraction duration had reached 18 seconds, only about 10% of participants were able to correctly recall the trigram.
Evaluate Peterson & Peterson’s experiment
Strength: Lab experiment -> high controlled env. -> extraneous variables won’t impact results
Strength: Reliable - can be replicated and have similar results making the experiment seem dependable
Limitation: Lacks mundane realism therefore cannot be used as representative data for real life situations
Limitation: Only focuses on one type of stimuli (elaborate later)
Who did an experiment to investigate the STM’s capacity?
Jacobs (1887)
Outline Jacobs’ experiment
Participants were given a string of digits and were expected to recall them correctly immediately after receiving it. If they got it correct, the amount of digits would increase by 1. The average amount of digits memorised was 7±2 digits.
Evaluate Jacob’s experiment
Strength: Supported by Miller’s observations
Who did an experiment to investigate STM and LTM coding?
Baddeley (1966)
Outline Baddeley’s experiment on coding
72 uni students - 4 groups, given 10 words that they were expected to recall in the given order
IV: the words given were either acoustically similar, acoustically dissimilar, semantically similar, semantically dissimilar
DV: their score on the recall test (as a percentage)
The pps undertook a recall test 4x. After the fourth trial, they took a break and completed an unrelated interference test. After this break, they were asked to recall the list of words again.
Results: STM codes acoustically, LTM codes semantically
Evaluate Baddeley’s experiment on coding
Strengths:
Generalisable - large sample size would even out any anomalies
Reliable - can be replicated by anyone, this experiment had been altered and repeated by Baddeley himself and he got similar results
Application - Results can be utilised: e.g. using mind maps with semantic links for revision
Limitations:
Generalisability: although there were a large number of participants, the conditions only had about 15-20 people. Acoustically similar only had 15 people which could greatly impact the results if an anomaly was present as the numbers are so small
Ecological Validity - lacks mundane realism as it is based on recalling the ORDER of words, rather than just the words themselves
Who did an experiment to investigate the efficiency of cognitive interviews
Fisher and Geiselman
Outline Geiselman’s experiment
89 students, 2 groups
Watched a simulated video of a crime
2 days later, they underwent either a CI or standard interview
Results:
Correct items recalled: C - 41.9, S - 29.4
Incorrect items recalled: C - 7.3, S - 6.1
Outline Fisher’s experiment
Used real witnesses from a crime scene in Canada
16 experienced detectives
Some pps underwent CI, others had a standard interview
Results showed that more information was elicited from the CI but there were no significant differences in accuracy of recall
Who did an experiment to investigate interference
McGeoh and McDonald
Outline the experiment for interference
5 groups were provided with 1 list that was identical and another list which differed
The second list either contained: synonyms, antonyms, words with no correlation, 3 digit numbers, consonant syllables
The 6th group was the control group and therefore only had 1 list
They were asked to recall the words from list 1
The results showed that interference is most severe when words are similar
Who did an experiment to investigate the weapon focus effect?
Johnson and Scott
Outline Johnson and Scott’s experiment
There were 2 conditions
One condition overheard a casual conversation and witnessed a man walk out holding a pen with grease on his hand
The other condition overheard a heated argument followed by the sound of breaking glass and they then witnessed a man walk out with a bloody knife.
The 2 groups were then asked to identify the man who had walked out from the 50 photos they had been given.
Pen Group: 49%
Knife Group: 33% , due to tunnel vision
Who carried out the study which shows that anxiety can increase the accuracy of EWT
Yuille and Cutshall
Outline Yuille and Cutshall’s experiment
Interviewed 13 of the 21 witnesses from a real shooting in Canada 5 months after the official police reviews
They were asked to assess how stressed they were at the time of the event on a 7 point scale
Results showed that the accuracy of the more stressed group was 88% whereas the accuracy of the less stressed group was 75%.
Outline the Yerkes-Dodson Law
At low levels of anxiety, the accuracy of EWT is low. However, as it increases, performance gets better and at a certain level, the performance is heightened. This point is known as the optimum anxiety level. Once anxiety levels surpass the optimum, the performance begins to decrease again.
Who conducted the experiment investigating leading questions?
Loftus
Outline Loftus’ experiment on leading questions
All participants watched the same video of a car crash and were asked the same questions about it. However, the leading question was slightly altered for each group as the verb differed. The leading question was asking how fast the car was going when it smashed/hit/crashed/contacted the other car. Results showed that the mean speed for the “smash” condition was 40.5mph but for “contacted” it was 31.8mph
Outline Bahrick’s experiment
396 American participants were asked to match names to the faces of those who they had graduated with 40 years prior
This experiment had been done before, after 14 years there was a 90% accuracy and after 40 years, there was a 60% accuracy
