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psychology. > memory - coding, capacity n duration. > Flashcards

memory - coding, capacity n duration. Flashcards

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1
Q

What is meant by “short-term memory”?

A

A limited capacity memory store where small amounts of information can be kept for a brief period of time.

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2
Q

What is meant by “long-term memory”?

A

A permanent memory store where limitless amounts of information can be stored for a long period of time.

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3
Q

What is meant by “coding”?

A

The way in which information is changed and stored in memory.

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4
Q

What is meant by “capacity”?

A

A measure of how much information can be held in memory.

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5
Q

What is meant by “duration”?

A

Length of time information can be held in memory.

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6
Q

What is meant by “encoding”?

A

Way information changes its format so it can be stored in memory.

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7
Q

What is meant by “storage”?

A

Holding information in the memory system.

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8
Q

What is meant by “retrieval”?

A

Recovering information from storage.

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9
Q

What are the types of memory?

A
  • sensory memory.
  • short-term memory.
  • long-term memory.
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10
Q

What is meant by “sensory memory”?

A

Where immediate information coming from the environment first registers in the sensory store.

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11
Q

What is the function of sensory memory?

A

To hold information for a fraction of a second after the physical stimulus is no longer there.

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12
Q

Is sensory memory visual or auditory?

A

Can be both.

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13
Q

What is the capacity of STM?

A
  • limited.
  • can only hold a small amount of information before it is forgotten.
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14
Q

How can STM be tested?

A

Using serial digit span study.

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15
Q

What experiments research the capacity of STM?

A
  • Jacob’s (1887).
  • Miller’s magic number experiment.
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16
Q

What was the aim of Jacob’s STM experiment?

A

Investigate the capacity of short-term memory for numbers and letters using a digit span test.

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17
Q

What is the procedure of Jacob’s STM experiment?

A
  1. sampled 443 female students aged 8 to 19.
    1. participants had to repeat back a string of numbers or letters in the same order.
      1. number of digits and letters gradually increased until participants could no longer recall the sequence.
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18
Q

What are the findings of Jacob’s STM experiment?

A

Students had an average span of 7.3 letters and 9.3 digits.

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19
Q

What is the conclusion of Jacob’s STM experiment?

A

Suggests the capacity of STM is very limited.

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20
Q

What is a weakness of Jacob’s STM experiment?

A

Lacks validity.

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21
Q

What is the evaluation of Jacob’s STM experiment - lacks validity?

A

POINT - one weakness is it is conducted a long time ago.
EVIDENCE - early research in psychology often lacked adequate control. some participants may have been distracted while they were being tested so did not perform well.
EXPLANATION - results may not be an accurate representation of STM capacity due to confounding variables.
LINK - suggests research lacks internal validity.

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22
Q

What is the evaluation point of the Jacob’s STM experiment - lacks validity?

A

One weakness is it is conducted a long time ago.

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23
Q

What is the evaluation evidence of the Jacob’s STM experiment - lacks validity?

A
  • early research in psychology often lacked adequate control.
  • some participants may have been distracted while they were being tested so did not perform well.
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24
Q

What is the evaluation explanation of the Jacob’s STM experiment - lacks validity?

A

Results may not be an accurate representation of STM capacity due to confounding variables.

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25
Q

What is the evaluation link of the Jacob’s STM experiment - lacks validity?

A

Suggests research lacks internal validity.

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26
Q

What was the aim of Miller’s magic number experiment?

A

Investigate the capacity of STM.

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27
Q

What is the procedure of Miller’s magic number experiment?

A

Reviewed literature of published investigations into perception and the STM from 1930s to 1950s.

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28
Q

What are the findings of Miller’s magic number experiment?

A
  • STM stores chunks of information rather than individual numbers or letters.
  • allows us to group information to help improve the capacity of STM.
    ↳ e.g. 1984 rather than 1. 9. 8. 4.
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29
Q

What is the conclusion of Miller’s magic number experiment?

A
  • organisation/encoding can extend the capacity of STM and enable information to be stored there.
  • hold seven items in the STM plus or minus two ranging between 5-9 items.
  • explains why we can recall items like mobile phone numbers which contain more than seven digits.
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30
Q

What is a weakness of Miller’s magic number experiment?

A

Overestimated STM capacity.

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31
Q

What is the evaluation of Miller’s magic number experiment - overestimated STM capacity?

A

POINT - one weakness is that it may have overestimated STM capacity.
EVIDENCE - Cowan (2001) reviewed other research and concluded that the capacity of STM is about 4 items.
EXPLANATION - shows that the lower end of Miller’s estimate of five items is more appropriate than seven items.
LINK - suggests we do not have accurate understanding of STM capacity.

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32
Q

How can the capacity of LTM be tested?

A

Impossible to test experimentally but does not appear to be limited.

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33
Q

What is the duration of STM?

A

Short.

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34
Q

How can memory be kept active in the STM?

A
  • rehearsal.
  • verbal rehearsal can allow the memory to be transferred to LTM.
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35
Q

What experiment researches the duration of STM?

A

Peterson and Peterson’s in 1959.

36
Q

What was the aim of Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment?

A

See if rehearsal was necessary to hold information in the STM store.

37
Q

What is the procedure of Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment?

A
  1. participants given sets of 3 letters to remember.
    1. immediately asked to count backwards in 3’s out loud for 3,6,9,12,15,18 seconds.
      ↳ done to prevent rehearsal.
      1. asked to recall the letters in the correct order.
38
Q

What are the findings of Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment?

A

The longer the interval the less accurate the recall.

39
Q

What is the conclusion of Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment?

A
  • cannot hold information in the STM store unless we rehearse it.
  • very short duration of approx. 18 seconds.
40
Q

What is a weakness of Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment?

A

Meaningless stimuli in STM study.

41
Q

What is the evaluation of Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment - meaningless stimuli in STM study?

A

POINT - one weakness is that the stimulus material was artificial.
EVIDENCE - made their participants memorise consonant syllables.
EXPLANATION - does not reflect real life memory activities where we try to remember more meaningful information.
LINK - suggests research lacks external validity.

42
Q

What is the evaluation point of the Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment - meaningless stimuli in STM study?

A

One weakness is that the stimulus material was artificial.

43
Q

What is the evaluation evidence of the Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment - meaningless stimuli in STM study?

A

Made their participants memorise consonant syllables.

44
Q

What is the evaluation explanation of the Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment - meaningless stimuli in STM study?

A

Does not reflect real life memory activities where we try to remember more meaningful information.

45
Q

What is the evaluation link of the Peterson and Peterson’s STM experiment - meaningless stimuli in STM study?

A

Suggests research lacks external validity.

46
Q

What experiment researches the duration of LTM?

A

Bahrick et al’s experiment in 1975.

47
Q

What was the aim of Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment?

A

Investigate duration of LTM.

48
Q

What is the procedure of Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment?

A
  1. studied 392 US high school graduates aged between 17 and 74.
    1. high school yearbooks were obtained from participants or directly from school.
      1. photo recognition test consisting of 50 photos from the high school yearbook.
        1. free recall test where participants recalled the name from their graduating class.
49
Q

What are the findings of Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment?

A
  • participants tested within 15 years of graduation were about 90% accurate in photo recognition.
  • after 48 years this declined to about 70%.
  • free recall less good than recognition.
  • after 15 years recall was 60% accurate and dropped to 30% after 48 years.
50
Q

What is the conclusion of Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment?

A

Suggests the duration of LTM lasts for a prolonged period of time.

51
Q

What is a strength of Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment?

A

Higher external validity.

52
Q

What is the evaluation of Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment - higher external validity?

A

POINT - one strength is it has high external validity.
EVIDENCE - studied real-life meaningful memories such as recalling the people in their high school years.
EXPLANATION - other studies have supported the idea that meaningful memories last longer in our LTM. Shepard (1967) found that studies on LTM conducted with meaningless pictures, recall rates were lower.
LINK - suggests the findings reflect an accurate duration of LTM.

53
Q

What is the evaluation point of the Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment - higher external validity?

A

One strength is it has high external validity.

54
Q

What is the evaluation evidence of the Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment - higher external validity?

A

Studied real-life meaningful memories such as recalling the people in their high school years.

55
Q

What is the evaluation explanation of the Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment - higher external validity?

A
  • other studies have supported the idea that meaningful memories last longer in our LTM.
  • Shepard (1967) found that studies on LTM conducted with meaningless pictures, recall rates were lower.
56
Q

What is the evaluation link of the Bahrick et al’s LTM experiment - higher external validity?

A

Suggests the findings reflect an accurate duration of LTM.

57
Q

How is memory coded?

A

The information arrives in your sensory memory as a sound or an image or a feeling.

58
Q

What is meant by “iconic memory”?

A

Visual memory.

59
Q

What is meant by “echoic memory”?

A

Auditory memory.

60
Q

What are the types of ways memory can be coded?

A
  • acoustic coding.
  • visual coding.
  • semantic coding.
61
Q

What is meant by “acoustic memory”?

A

Sound of a stimulus.

62
Q

What is meant by “visual memory”?

A

Physical appearance of a stimulus.

63
Q

What is meant by “semantic memory”?

A

Meaning of a stimulus.

64
Q

What type of way is STM coded?

A

Acoustically.

65
Q

What type of way is LTM coded?

A

Semantically.

66
Q

How is STM coded?

A
  • information arrives in sensory memory in its original form such as sound or vision.
  • information needs to be encoded in a form that the STM store can deal with.
67
Q

What experiment researches the coding of STM and LTM?

A

Baddeley’s experiment.

68
Q

What was the aim of Baddeley experiment?

A

Investigate what type of information is encoded by the STM and LTM.

69
Q

What is the procedure of Baddeley’s experiment?

A
  1. gave different lists of words to the four groups of participants to remember.
    1. group one had acoustically similar words such as cat, cab, car.
      1. group two had acoustically dissimilar words such as pit, few, cow.
        1. group three had semantically similar words such as great, large, big.
          1. group four had semantically dissimilar words such as good, huge, hot.
70
Q

What are the findings of Baddeley’s experiment?

A
  • when participants had to do this task immediately after hearing it (STM recall) they performed worse with acoustically similar words.
  • if participants were asked to recall a word list after a time interval of 20 minutes (LTM recall) they performed worse with the semantically similar words.
71
Q

What is the conclusion of Baddeley’s experiment?

A

Suggests that information is coded acoustically in the STM and semantically in the LTM.

72
Q

What is a strength of Baddeley’s experiment?

A

Separate memory stores.

73
Q

What is a weakness of Baddeley’s experiment?

A

Artificial stimuli.

74
Q

What is the evaluation of Baddeley’s experiment - separate memory stores?

A

POINT - one strength is it has identified a difference between two memory stores.
EVIDENCE - identified that STM and LTM codes in different ways in his research.
EXPLANATION - found that STM codes acoustically and LTM codes semantically.
LINK - shows that there must be separate stores which each have a specific function.

75
Q

What is the evaluation of Baddeley’s experiment - artificial stimuli?

A

POINT - one weakness is it has used artificial stimuli rather than meaningful material.
EVIDENCE - the word list had no personal meaning to the participants.
EXPLANATION - tells us very little about coding different memory tasks, especially in day to day life.
LINK - has very limited application.

76
Q

What is the evaluation point of the Baddeley’s experiment - separate memory stores?

A

One weakness is it has used artificial stimuli rather than meaningful material.

77
Q

What is the evaluation evidence of the Baddeley’s experiment - separate memory stores?

A

The word list had no personal meaning to the participants.

78
Q

What is the evaluation explanation of the Baddeley’s experiment - separate memory stores?

A

Tells us very little about coding different memory tasks, especially in day to day life.

79
Q

What is the evaluation link of the Baddeley’s experiment - separate memory stores?

A

Has very limited application.

80
Q

What is the evaluation point of the Baddeley’s experiment - artificial stimuli?

A

One weakness is it has used artificial stimuli rather than meaningful material.

81
Q

What is the evaluation evidence of the Baddeley’s experiment - artificial stimuli?

A

The word list had no personal meaning to the participants.

82
Q

What is the evaluation explanation of the Baddeley’s experiment - artificial stimuli?

A

Tells us very little about coding different memory tasks, especially in day to day life.

83
Q

What is the evaluation link of the Baddeley’s experiment - artificial stimuli?

A

Has very limited application.

84
Q

What is the evaluation point of the Miller’s magic number experiment - overestimated STM capacity?

A

One weakness is that it may have overestimated STM capacity.

85
Q

What is the evaluation evidence of the Miller’s magic number experiment - overestimated STM capacity?

A

Cowan (2001) reviewed other research and concluded that the capacity of STM is about 4 times.

86
Q

What is the evaluation explanation of the Miller’s magic number experiment - overestimated STM capacity?

A

Shows that the lower end of Miller’s estimate of five items is more appropriate than seven items.

87
Q

What is the evaluation link of the Miller’s magic number experiment - overestimated STM capacity?

A

Suggests we do not have accurate understanding of STM capacity.

psychology. (36 decks)

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