Memory

Question 1

Strengths of Peterson & Peterson (STM Duration)

Answer 1

• We do sometimes try to remember meaningless things such as phone numbers, so the study is not totally irrelevant

Question 2

Weaknesses of Peterson & Peterson (STM Duration)

Answer 2

• The stimulus material is artificial.
  Trying to memorise trigrams does not reflect real life memory activities.
  Therefore, this study lacks external validity.
• The task of counting down during the retention interval may have displaced the trigrams from the short-term memory.
  This is because the short-term memory has a limited capacity, so there’s not enough room for both types of data.
• Researchers believe that their findings was due to decay of the trigrams overtime, hence, they thought they were investigating the duration of short-term memory.
  However, due to displacement, they may have in fact, been investigating the limited capacity of short-term memory instead.

Question 3

Strengths of Bahrick et al (LTM Duration)

Answer 3

• It has high external validity.
  This is because real life, meaningful memories have been studied.

Question 4

Weaknesses of Bahrick et al (LTM Duration)

Answer 4

• Confounding variables are not controlled.
  For example, participants may have looked at their yearbook photos and rehearsed their memory over the years.

Question 5

Weaknesses of Miller (STM Capacity)

Answer 5

• Lacking validity.
  It was conducted a long time ago.
  Any research in psychology lacks adequate control e.g participants may have been distracted whilst being tested.
  This means that results are not as valid, because there were confounding variables that were not controlled.

Question 6

Weaknesses of Baddeley (STM and LTM coding)

Answer 6

• It uses quite artificial stimuli rather than meaningful material.
  The word lists had no personal meaning to the participants, thus, we should be cautious about generalising the findings to different kinds of memory tasks.

Question 7

Strengths of The Multi Store Model

Answer 7

• Baddeley’s research found that…
  1) We tend to mix of words that sound similar when we use our short-term memory
  2) We tend to mix up words that have similar meanings when using our long-term memory
  This shows that the coding in the short term memory is acoustic, whereas the coding in the long-term memory is semantic.
  It supports the multi store model as it shows that the two memory stores are separate and independent.

Question 8

Weaknesses of The Multi Store Model

Answer 8

• Case study of a patient with amnesia known as KF.
  They found that KF’s short-term memory for digits was very poor when read aloud to him.
  However, his recall was much better when he was able to read the digits to himself.
  Research shows that there must be one short-term store to process visual information and another to process auditory information.
  This directly contrasts the unitary STM in the multi store model.
• Study found out what matters about rehearsal is the type.
  There are two types of rehearsal - maintenance rehearsal and elaborative rehearsal.
  The MSM describes the maintenance rehearsal, how about this does not transfer information into the LTM.
  Maintenance rehearsal, simply maintains information in the STM.
  Elaborative rehearsal is needed for long-term storage.
  This occurs when you link the information to your existing knowledge, or think about what it means.
• Study showed that if something was of interest then it is more likely to be recalled, regardless of rehearsal.
  This is because interesting information is automatically coded semantically so it does not need to be rehearsed.
  It disproves the MSM because it shows that information does not have to be rehearsed to go into the LTM, decreasing its validity.

Question 9

Strengths of Types of LTM

Answer 9

• Case study of Clive Wearing.
  He experienced severe amnesia and could not remember life events or taste of food, but could still play the piano.
  This suggests his semantic and episodic memory was damaged but his procedural memory was not.
  This shows that the LTM is not a unitary store and supports the existence of different LTM stores.
• Neuroimaging evidence
  Brain scan studies support the existence of separate LTM stores.
  Tulving et al(1994) used PET scans while participants carried out different tasks to see which part of the brain was active.
  He found that episodic and semantic memory was recalled from the prefrontal cortex.
  However, procedural memory was recalled from the cerebellum.
  This shows that there are physically different locations for the 3 types of LTM stores, hence confirming there are several LTM stores.

Question 10

Weaknesses of Types of LTM

Answer 10

• Some psychologists claim that there are only 2 LTM stores - declarative(episodic and semantic) and non declarative(procedural).
  a) Clive Wearing, declarative effected but non declarative not effected
  b) Tulving PET scans show that declarative is in the prefrontal cortex and non declarative is in the cerebellum
  Hence more research is needed to determine whether episodic and semantic should be declared as 1 store.
• 4th store evidence - Priming.
  Priming is the idea of association. Exposure to 1 stimulus influences the response to another.
  This is not supported in the existing stores.
  So more research is needed to determine just how many stores there are.

Question 11

Strengths of The Working Memory Model

Answer 11

• The KF study.
  He suffered brain damage and consequently had poor STM ability for verbal information but could process visual information normally.
  This suggests that his phonological loop had been damaged, leaving other areas of the STM intact.
  It supports the existence of separate visual and acoustic stores.
• Dual task performance.
  It supports the existence of the visuospatial sketchpad.
  Baddeley et al(1975) found that participants had more difficulty doing to visual tasks, then doing both a visual and verbal task at the same time.
  This is because both visual tasks compete for the same slave system, whereas when doing a verbal and visual task simultaneously, there is no competition.
  This is evidence for the fact that there must be a separate slave system(the VSS) that processes visual input.

Question 12

Weaknesses of The Working Memory Model

Answer 12

• KF case study may not be reliable because evidence from brain damaged patients concerns unique cases with patients who have had traumatic experiences.
• Lack of clarity over the central executive.
  This component of the working memory model is not fully understood as it needs to be more clearly specified, then just being ‘attention’.
  This means that the WMM hasn’t been fully explained.

Question 13

Strengths for Interference as an Explanation for Forgetting

Answer 13

• Study observed retroactive interference.
  They did this by changing the similarity between 2 sets of word lists.
  Participants learnt a list of 10 words until they could remember it with 100% accuracy.
  They then learnt a new list.
  6 groups had to learn 2 different types of tests.

They found that synonyms produced the worst recall.
This shows that interference is strongest when the memories are similar.

• Most lab studies showed that both types of interference are likely to be common ways we forget information from LTM
  This is a strength because lab experiments control the effects of extraneous and confounding variables.
  They also give confidence that interference is a valid explanation for at least some forgetting.
• External validity.
  Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch(1977).
  They wanted to find if interference was a better explanation for forgetting than the passage of time.
  They asked rugby players to remember the names of the teams they had played so far in that season week by week.
  Because most players missed games, for some of them the last team they played was 2 weeks ago, or 3 weeks ago and so on.

They found that accurate recall did not depend on how long ago the matches took place, but the number of games played in the meantime was more important.
E.g a player’s recall of a team from 3 weeks ago was better if they had played no matches since.

Question 14

Weaknesses of Interference as an Explanation for Forgetting

Answer 14

• There is a chance that interference is demonstrated more in a lab than in real-life situations.
  This is because the stimuli is artificial, hence making interference more likely.
  So interference may not be an explanation for forgetting in real life.

Question 15

Strengths of Retrieval Failure as an Explanation for Forgetting

Answer 15

• Context dependent forgetting.
  Study conducted on deep sea divers.
  Participants had to learn lists of words and then asked to recall them.
  The divers were out into 4 conditions.
  Learn on land and recall on land
  Learn on land and recall underwater
  Learn underwater recall underwater
  Learn underwater recall on land

Recall was 40% lower in non matching conditions.
This shows that external cues at learning were different from the ones at recall, hence leading to retrieval failure.

• State dependent forgetting.
  Gave antihistamine drugs to their participants.
  The antihistamines have a mild sedative effect making participants slightly drowsy.
  Participants had to learn lists of words and then asked to recall them.
  There were 4 conditions.
  Learn on drug, recall on drug
  Learn on drug, recall when not on drug
  Learn when not on drug, recall on drug
  Learn when not on drug, recall when not on drug

The antihistamines create an internal psychological state different from the ‘normal’ state of being awake and alert.
Performance on memory was significantly worse when there was a mismatch in internal state at learning and recall.

Question 16

Weaknesses of Retrieval Failure as an Explanation for Forgetting

Answer 16

• Baddeley argues that context effects are not important, especially in real life.
  E.g it would be very hard to find an environment as different from land as underwater.
  Learning something in 1 room and then recalling it in another does not have much of an effect because the environments are not different enough.
  This is a limitation because it means that there aren’t many real life applications for retrieval failure due to context cues causing forgetting.
• Recall vs recognition.
  Godden and Baddeley.
  They replicated their underwater experiment but tested if participants recognised any words read to them from the list rather than recalling it themselves.
  When recognition was tested, there were no context dependent effects.
  Performance was the same in all 4 conditions.
  This is another limitation and it means that the presence or absence of cues only affects memory when you test it in a certain way.

Question 17

Strengths of Misleading Information Affecting EWT

Answer 17

• It has important, real - life, practical uses where the consequences of EWT can be very serious.
  It highlights that police officers must be very careful about how they word their questions when interviewing eyewitnesses.
  This can improve the way the legal system works.
• Study
  They arranged participants(students) to watch film clips of car accidents and then gave them questions about the accident.
  There were 5 groups each given a different misleading question e.g ‘How fast were the cars going when they hit eachother’?
  The verb hit was replaced by ‘contacted’, ‘bumped’, ‘collided’, and ‘smashed’.
  Mean estimated speed for the verb ‘contacted’ was 31.8mph.

Question 18

Weaknesses of Misleading Information Affecting EWT

Answer 18

• he tasks are artificial as ppts watched film clips of a car accident.
  This a very different experience than watching a real life accident as it lacks stress of the situation and there is evidence to suggest that stress can influence memory.
  It is a limitation as it does not tell us the extent to which leading questions are influential in real life situations.
  Lacking external validity.

Question 19

Strengths of Anxiety Affecting EWT negatively

Answer 19

• Study
  They led participants to believe they were going to take part in a lab study.
  Whilst they were seated in the waiting room, participants heard an argument in the next room.

In the ‘low anxiety’ condition, a man then walked through the waiting area carrying a pen with grease on his hands

In the ‘high anxiety’ conditions participants heard the sound of breaking glass and a man walked through the waiting room carrying a paper knife covered with blood
In the low anxiety condition, 49% of participants were able to identify the man carrying the pen.
In the ‘high anxiety’ condition, only 33% of participants were able to identify the man carrying the knife.
The tunnel theory of memory argues that a witness’s attention narrows to focus on a weapon because it is a source of anxiety.

Question 20

Weaknesses of Anxiety Affecting EWT negatively

Answer 20

• It may be testing surprise instead of anxiety.
  Participants may focus on the weapon because they are surprised rather than scared.
  Pickel(1998) conducted a similar study using scissors, a gun, a wallet, or a raw chicken in a hairsalon.
  Eyewitness accuracy was poor in highly unusual conditions(the gun and raw chciken).
  This suggests that weapon focus effect is due to unusualness rather than anxiety.
  Therefore, the study lacks validity as it is not measuring what it intended to measure.
• Anxiety may have a positive impact on reacall.

Question 21

Strengths of Field Study Showing Anxiety Has a Positive Impact on EWT

Answer 21

• Ethical isues in creading a high anxiety situation can be avoided.
  As it is a real life study, researchers are not subjecting participants to psychological harm.
  Psychologists are simply interviewing people who have already witnessed a real-life event so there is no need to recreate it.

Question 22

Weaknesses of of Field Study Showing Anxiety Has a Positive Impact on EWT

Answer 22

• Field studies may lack control e.g post event discussion and extraneous variables which may exaggerate and make the effects of anxiety overwhelmed by otherfactors.

Question 23

Strengths of The Enhanced Cognitive Interview

Answer 23

• Mine and Bull found that ‘report everything’ and ‘context reinstatement’ produced better recall than any other conditions.
  This proves that some aspects of the CI are more useful than others.
  It suggests that at least these 2 elements should be used to improve police interviewing in EWT even if the whole cognitive interview is not used.
• Meta analysis by Konnken et al combined data of 50 studies.
  It showed that the ECI consistently provided more correct information than the standard police interview.
  There are real practical benefits of the ECI.
  Gives police a greater chance of catching and charging criminals, which is beneficial to society as a whole.

Question 24

Weaknesses of The Enhanced Cognitive Interview

Answer 24

• Study shows that using the cognitive interview increase correct information recall by 81%. However there was also a 61% increase in incorrect information(false positives) when the ECI was compared to the standard interview.