Memory

Question 1

What is memory

Answer 1

The process by which we retain information about events that have happened in the past

Question 2

Sensory register

Answer 2

Temporarily stored information from our senses, unless we pay attention is disappears quickly, limited capacity with little duration, coded dependant on the sense that picked it up.

Question 3

Short-term memory

Answer 3

The info we are currently aware of, or thinking about. Info found in this comes from paying attention to sensory memories

Question 4

Long-term memory

Answer 4

Continual storage of information which is largely outside of our awareness, but can be called into working memory to be used when needed

Question 5

Duration of Memory

Answer 5

STM- last very short period of time, unless they are rehearsed causing limited duration
LTM- can last from 2mins to 100years, has unlimited duration

Question 6

Coding

Answer 6

How we convert information from one form to another. Short term is coded acoustically and long term semantically

Question 7

Digit span

Answer 7

A way of measuring the capacity of STM

Question 8

Miller (1956)

Answer 8

Notes that things come in 7s: 7notes in music, 7days of the week…
Suggests our STM capacity is 7 items (plus or minus 2)
Miller argued that our capacity can be increased if we chunk items together

Question 9

Baddeley (1966)

Answer 9

Gave different lists of words to 4 groups of pptts to remember. 2 acoustically similar and dissimilar, 2 semantically similar and dissimilar. Asked to recall words in correct order. When they recalled immediately they tended to do worse with the acoustically similar words. When they called 20mins after they did worse on the semantically similar words.

Question 10

Encoding

Answer 10

The way information is changed so it can be stored in memory. Info enters the brain via the senses but it is stored in different forms:
Visual, Acoustic, Semantic

Question 11

Two sub-divisions of LTM

Answer 11

Explicit- you can put it into words, need conscious thought to be recalled, often formed through several combined memories. Include semantic and episodic memories
Implicit- more difficult to put into words. Can be recalled without conscious thought. Include procedural memories

Question 12

Episodic memory

Answer 12

Personal experiences, these are time stamped. Conscious effort to recall, strength of memory is influenced by emotion

Question 13

Semantic Memory

Answer 13

Concerns factual knowledge an individual has learned. These are not time stamped. Linked to episodic and new knowledge is linked to experience

Question 14

Procedural memory

Answer 14

Concerned with learning motor skills. Without conscious effort. Difficult to explain in words, also involved in language

Question 15

Glanzer and Cunitz (1966)

Answer 15

Showed pptts a list of 20 words, presented one at a time and then asked them to recall. Results created the primacy effect and the recency effect

Question 16

Primacy effect

Answer 16

Research shows pptts are able to recall the first few items of a list better than those in the middle as the multi-store model indicates that earlier items have been rehearsed better and transferred to LTM

Question 17

Recency effect

Answer 17

Pptts also tend to remember the last few items better than those from the middle as STM has a limited capacity the items in the middle if not rehearsed are displaced by last few items, which remain in STM to be recalled

Question 18

Support for the Multi-Store Model

Answer 18

The primacy effect occurs because the first words are best rehearsed and transferred to LTM. The recency effect occurs because these are the last words to be presented. Therefore they are fresh and in STM at the start of recall. People with amnesia have an unaffected short term memory but their long term is very poor which supports by showing the two are separate stores

Question 19

Working Memory Model

Answer 19

Central Executive, Phonological loop, Visuo-spatial sketch pad, Episodic Buffer

Question 20

Central Executive

Answer 20

Direct attention to tasks. The central executive decides what working memory pays attention to.

Question 21

Phonological loop

Answer 21

Limited capacity, deals with auditory information and preserves word order. Baddeley further subdivided it into phonological store which holds words heard and articulatory process which silently repeats those words like an inner voice. This is a kind of maintenance rehearsal

Question 22

Visuo-spatial sketch pad

Answer 22

Visual and/or spatial information stored here, visual- what things look like, spatial- relationships between things. Limited capacity.

Question 23

Episodic Buffer

Answer 23

Briefly stores info from the other subsystems and integrates it together, along with info from LTM, to make complete scenes or ‘episodes’

Question 24

Interference

Answer 24

Memory traces gradually decay. During decay a memory is subject to the effects of time and interference from other experiences. Memories seem to be forgotten because we no longer have the appropriate reminders. When one memory blocks another

Question 25

Proactive interference

Answer 25

Forgetting occurs when older memories disrupt the recall of newer memories

Question 26

Retroactive interference

Answer 26

Forgetting occurs when newer memories disrupt the recall of older memories already stored

Question 27

Retrieval Failure and Cues

Answer 27

Information is available but cannot be recalled due to the absence of appropriate cues. When we encode a new memory we also store information that occurred around its cues, such as the way we felt or the place we were in. If we cannot remember or recall it, it could be because we are not in a similar situation to when the memory was originally stored. Cues can be internal like moods or external like surroundings so the info still exists but is inaccessible

Question 28

Tulving and Psotka (1971)

Answer 28

Tested the ability of retrieval through LTM and found that interference had not caused forgetting because memories became accessible if a cue was used, showing they were available

Question 29

Eye witness Testimony

Answer 29

The ability of people to remember the details of events which they have observed

Question 30

Misleading information (EWT)

Answer 30

Incorrect information given to the EW usually after the event

Question 31

Post-event discussion (EWT)

Answer 31

Occurs when there is more than one witness to an event. Witnesses may discuss what they have seen with other co-witnesses. This effects accuracy because they may combine misinformation from others with their own memories

Question 32

The tunnel theory

Answer 32

An explanation for the weapon-focus effect is that the weapon narrows the field of attention and thus reduced information to be stored

Question 33

The cognitive interview

Answer 33

A questioning technique used by the police to enhance retrieval of information from the witnesses memory. Improves effectiveness of questioning witnesses.

Question 34

Context Reinstatement

Answer 34

Mentally reinstate the context of the target event. Recall the scene, the weather, what you were thinking and feeling at the time, the preceding events. This supports context dependent memory

Question 35

Recall from changed perspective (CP)

Answer 35

Try to describe the episode as it would have been seen from different view points, not just your own. Disrupts your schema

Question 36

Recall in reverse order (RO)

Answer 36

Report the episode in several different temporal orders moving backwards and forwards in time

Question 37

The Enhanced Cognitive Interview -Fisher (1987)

Answer 37

An amended version of the CI that seeks to build a trusting relationship between interviewer and witness and improve the quality of the communication between the two. Witness controls flow of info, no interruptions, open ended questions, pptts don’t guess or say ‘idk’, reduce anxiety of witness.

Question 38

Peterson and Peterson (1959)

Answer 38

Pptts shown 3 random consonants (like CVM) and asked to recall after 3 seconds and 18 seconds. During the pause they were asked to count backwards in threes from a given number, as an ‘interference task’ to prevent them from repeating letters internally. After 3 seconds 80% remembered correct, after 18 seconds 10% did. When rehearsal is prevented, very little can stay in STM for longer than around 18seconds.

Question 39

Limitations of the Multi-Store Model of Memory

Answer 39

Information is transferred from STM to LTM through rehearsal but in real life people don’t always spend time rehearsing, yet they still transfer information into LTM. Rehearsal isn’t always needed to be stored and some items can’t be rehearsed.
Model is oversimplified as there isn’t one ST store and one LT store, which has been shown by brain damaged patients

Question 40

Limitations of the working model of memory

Answer 40

Only explains how information is dealt with in short-term memory, it doesn’t explain how information is transferred to long-term memory.
Only research supporting has be laboratory experiments so it may not be representative of the real world

Question 41

Weaknesses of Interference Theory

Answer 41

Interference effects seem much greater in artificial laboratory settings than they do in real life, so it may not be as strong of a theory.
The theory gives us an explanation for why we forget but it doesn’t go into the cognitive or biological processes involved.

Question 42

Loftus and Zanni (1975)

Answer 42

Pptts were shown a film of a car crash and they were then asked either, Did you see the broken headlight? or did you see a broken headlight? There was no broken headlight in the film. 17% of those asked about ‘the’ headlight claimed they saw one compared to 7% asked about ‘a’ headlight. The use of the word ‘the’ is enough to effect accuracy of people’s memories of an event.

Question 43

Anxiety effect on focus

Answer 43

Small increases in anxiety and arousal may increase the accuracy of memory, but high levels have a negative effect on accuracy

Question 44

The steps of a cognitive interview

Answer 44

1. Interviewer tries to make the witness relax
2. Witness mentally recreates the context of the crime scene
3. Witness reports everything possible even irrelevant things
4. Witness asked to recall details in different orders
5. Witness asked to recall from different perspectives
6. Interviewer avoids any judgemental/personal comments

Question 45

Geiselman et al (1986)- effect of the cognitive interview

Answer 45

In a staged situation an intruder with a blue rucksack enters a classroom and stole a slide projector, two days later pptts questioned about the event using independent groups. Use standard or cognitive interviewing, early in questions they were asked ‘was the guy with the green backpack nervous’ and at the end asked ‘what colour was the rucksack’. Pptts in cognitive were less likely to recall the rucksack as green, therefore the cognitive technique reduces the effect of leading questions

Question 46

Multi-Store Model

Answer 46

Three stores: sensory register, short-term store, long-term store and information has to move through these stores to become a memory

Question 47

Strengths of the Working Memory Model

Answer 47

Model has less emphasis on rehearsal than the multi-store model of memory. Rather than being the key process, rehearsal is just one possible process in the working memory model, can explain why some things end up in long-term memory without rehearsal

Question 48

Loftus (1979)

Answer 48

In a study with independent groups, pptts heard discussion in a nearby room, in one condition a man came out of the room with a pen and grease on his hands, in the second he came out carrying a knife covered in blood. Pptts asked to identify the man from 50 photographs. In condition 1 pptts we’re 49% accurate but in condition 2 only 33% were. When anxious and aroused, witnesses focus on a weapon at the expense of other details. High ecological validity but ethical issue as pptts could have been very distressed

Question 49

Yuille and Cutshall (1986)

Answer 49

Showed that witnesses of a real incident has remarkably accurate memories. A thief was shot and killed by police and witnesses were interviewed, 13 re-interviewed 5 months later. Highly accurate recall. Misleading questions had no effect. High ecological validity as it was real, witnesses with highest stress were closest to event so accuracy of recall may have been due to proximity