memory Flashcards
what are the 3 stores in the MSM model?
Sensory register —> Short term Memory —> Long term Memory
what does the Sensory register do?
receives raw sense impressions
- Attention passed info into STM
- Coding = modality
what does the STM do?
- receives info from the SR by Attention or from the LTM by Retrieval
- keeps info by maintenance rehearsal
- coding = acoustic
- duration = approx 18 secs
- capacity = 7 +- 2 items
what does the LTM do?
- very long/ permanent memory storage
- to use info it must be Retrieved to the STM
- coding = semantic
- duration = very long/ permanent
- capacity = theoretically unlimited
Strengths of MSM
- Glazner & Cunitz found the LTM and STM are separate. Words at the start and end of word list are recalled more easily
research proving capacity of MSM
- Spearing (recall of a random row of a 12 letter grid was 75% suggests all rows are stored in SR)
- Jacobs (recall for lists averaged 7 items for letters and 9 for numbers. capacity of 7 +- 2)
- Wagenaar (tested himself on his 2400 diary entries and found 75% recall for critical details. suggests very large storage of LTM)
research proving duration of MSM
- Sperling (recall of a random row of a 12 letter grid was 75% all 12 could not be written as they were forgot too quickly)
- Peterson & Peterson (recall of 3 letter trigrams was less than 10% after 18 secs if performing an interfering task. suggest short STM duration)
- Bahrick (recall of school peers names from photos was 90% after 15 years and 80% after 48 years. suggests LTM duration is very long/ maybe limitless)
research proving coding of MSM
- Baddely (four 10 word lists were given to participants, words were acoustically similar or dissimilar and semantically similar or dissimilar. immediate recall was worse for acoustically similar words and recall after 20 mins was worse for semantically similar words. Suggests STM is coded acoustically and LTM is coded semantically)
weaknesses of MSM
-research is highly artificial (low mundane realism) which reduces ecological validity
- there are different types of LTM and WMM explains STM in more detail
- the capacity of STM can be altered (age or practice)
what are the Types of LTM?
- Episodic
- Semantic
- Procedural
what are Episodic Memories?
- experiences/ events
- time stamped
- declarative
- recalled consciously
what are Semantic Memories?
- facts, meanings and knowledge
- declarative
- recalled consciously
- not time stamped
- episodic becomes semantic over time
- longer lasting than episodic
what are Procedural Memories?
- unconscious memories of skills
- often learnt in childhood
- non-declarative
- not recalled consciously
strengths for types of LTM
- Vargha-Khadem (children with damage to hippocampus had episodic amnesia but could still learn and retain semantic info)
- Clive Wearing (has retrograde amnesia so can’t remember episodic memories but can remember facts about his life and can play the piano. semantic, episodic and procedural are all separate)
- Tulving (fMRIs identified which types of LTM memory are associated with different parts of the brain)
limitation of types of LTM
- generalising the findings of ideographic clinical cases to explain how memory works in the wider population is problematic
- types of LTM may not be truest distinct
who developed the Working Memory Model?
Baddely and Hitch - an active processor made of multiple stores - made to replace the STM
what is the WMM made up of?
- Central executive
- Phonological loop
- Visuo-spatial sketchpad
- Episodic buffer
what is the Central executive?
- receives sense information
- controls attention and filters info before passing on to the subsystems
- limited capacity (4)
- capable of dealing with 1 strand of info at a time
what is the Phonological loop?
- processes sound info
- acoustic coding
- made up of: Primary Acoustic Store (inner ear, storing recent words) & Articulatory Process (inner voice, storing sub-vocal repetition)
- capacity of 2 secs
what is the Visio-spatial sketchpad?
- processes visual and spatial info
- made up of: Visual Cache (passive store of form and colour) & Inner Scribe (active store of relationships in 3D space)
what is the Episodic buffer?
- a general store to hold and combine info from VSS, PL, CE and LTM
strength of the WMM
- Baddely (when doing two visual tasks it was found that performance was much better when the tasks were not using the same processing. this suggests the VSS and PL are different subsystems)
- Shallice and Warrington (KF has a selective impairment to his verbal STM but visual functioning was not affected. suggests PL and VSS are in separate brain regions)
- Baddely (found participants could recall more short words than long words. suggests PL is the time it says to say the words approx 2 secs, word length effect)
- the WMM seems more accurate than the STM components of the MSM in describing how memory is used as an active processor
limitations of WMM
- low external validity due to low mundane realism making it less generalisable
- the Central executive is a concept without full explanation of its function
- inferences must be made due to it being impossible to directly observe the processes of memory
what is interference theory?
we forget because our long term memories get disrupted by other information when it is coded
what are the 2 types of interference?
- proactive interference
- retroactive interference
what is retroactive interference?
new information being stored disrupts recall of old info
what is proactive interference?
old information already stored interferes with recalling something new
what factors increase chance of interference?
- Similarity: when two pieces of info are similar interference increases due to response competition
- Time sensitivity: interference is less likely when there is a large gap between learning
what is cue dependant forgetting?
information is in the LTM but forgetting happens due to the absence of appropriate cues/ prompts encoded at the same time
what are Context dependent cues?
aspects of our external environment work as cues (sight, sounds, smells) being in a different place inhibits memory
what is state dependant cues?
aspects of our internal environment work as cue to memory (emotions, drugs, arousal) being in a different emotional state inhibits memory
what are strengths for Interference?
- retroactive: Schmidt (questionnaire for 211 11-79 year olds with a map of the area around their old schools without street names. the more times someone moved house the fewest street names could be recalled. suggests having had more street names made recalling old names harder)
- proactive: Greenberg & Underwood (participants given a list of 10 word pairs and were given a new list every 48 hours. found the number of correctly recalled word pairs decreased the more word pairs learnt previously. suggest the later learnt words interfered with the previous ones)
limitation of interference?
- only explains forgetting when 2 sets of info are similar and learnt close together in time. therefore struggles to explain day-to-day example of forgetting
strengths of Cue dependant forgetting
- context dependent: Godden & Baddely (material was learnt underwater and on land. recall was better with divers if learnt in the same environment they were tested in. suggests environmental cues promote recall)
- state dependent: Overton (Material learnt drunk and sober. found recall was better when in the same internal state. suggests internal cues promote recall)
- research into forgetting has practical applications; students can develop effective revision strategies and the techniques of the cognitive interview
limitations of cue dependant forgetting?
- interference and cue dependent forgetting only explain a temporary loss of information. may not be a valid explaination of forgetting
what are the methods used in the cognitive interview?
- reinstate the context
- change the perspective
- state everything
- reverse the order
strengths of cognitive interview
Kohnken meta-analysis
- 55 studies found CI gave 41% in accurate information
limitations of cognitive interview
not all elements are equally useful
- Milne and Bull found ‘report everything’ and ‘reinstate the context’ produced the best information
Time consuming
- the training necessary for the cognitive interview as may not be realistic for all officers to complete
how does anxiety negatively effect recall?
Johnson and Scott did an experiment with 2 conditions - the low anxiety condition and the high anxiety condition
in the low anxiety condition the participants saw a man walk past with oily hands and a pen
in the high anxiety condition participants overheard a heated argument and then a man walk past with a knife covered in blood.
- identification from the low anxiety condition was 49%
- identification in the high anxiety condition was 33%
how does anxiety have a positive effect on recall?
Yuille and Cutshall did a study on a shooting of a gun shop in Canada.
they interview 13 witnesses and asked them to report what happened and rate their anxiety levels on a 1-7 scale
- the people who reported the highest levels of stress were the most accurate - 88%
what is the Yerkes Dodson law?
there is an optimal level of anxiety which is the point of maximum accuracy. but the accuracy is decreased when anxiety is too low or too high
strength of anxiety on recall
negative effect on recall
- Valentine and Mesout measured anxiety through heart rate and found that high anxiety participants couldn’t recall as much about the London Dungeon Labyrinths
positive effect on recall
- Christianson and Hubinette interviewed 58 witnesses of a bank robbery and found that those who were directly involved had the greatest recall
limitations of anxiety on recall
unusualness not anxiety
- Pickel did a study using a raw chicken, scissors, gun or wallet in a hair salon video and found that eye witness accuracy was worse in the unusual scenarios
- limitation to Johnson and Scott study
how do leading questions effect EWT?
Loftus and Palmer
- 45 participants asked to estimate speed of car crash video but given different verbs in the question - ‘hit’, ‘contacted’, ‘collided’, ‘smashed’ and ‘bumped’
- contacted had lowest mean estimation - 31.8 mph
whereas smashed had the highest - 40.5 mph
- this suggests the wording of a question can ‘alter the memory’
how does Post Event Discussion effect EWT?
Gabbert
- studied participants in pairs who each watched a video of the same crime from different POV’s meaning the could see things the other couldnt
- they found that 71% recalled something that they couldnt see in their video after discussing the events compared to 0% in a control group
strengths of Misleading Information
real world application
- important usage in the criminal justice system as police officers need to be careful in how they phrase questions as to not ‘distort’ the memories
- suggests an impact in preventing wrong convictions
limitations of misleading information
Sutherland and Hayne
- when participants were asked a misleading question following a video clip their recall was more accurate for central details of the event than for peripheral ones
- suggests original memories for the central details remained un-distorted
Not Explaination of PED
- Gabbert doesnt explain why PED affect recall
- Could be due to desire to conform, poor memory, e.c.t.
