Memory - Research Flashcards
What is Memory?
The process by which we retain information about events that have happened in the past
Explain research into coding
Baddeley had 4 groups, 1 were given a list of words that were acoustically similar, 2 were acoustically dissimilar 3 were semantically similar and 4 semantically dissimilar.
Ppts were asked to recall their list of words in order.
Findings : when ppts recalled immediately after hearing they did worse with acoustically similar words.
when asked to recall 20 minutes later they did worse with semantically similar words
Evaluate Baddley’s research into coding
✅ Lab experiment & easily replicable - All extraneous variables were controlled and it is easier to establish a causal relationship
❌ Artificial material - as they used a list of words that is meaningless
Explain research into capacity
Jacob’s digit span involved numbers/letters having to be recalled in the correct order. Ppts were given 4 digits to recall, if correct they were then given 5 digits. This continued until all ppts could no longer recall
Findings : Mean digit span was 9.3 items and mean span for letters was 7.3
Evaluate Jacob’s digit span
✅ replicable
❌ outdated - lacks validity as the study was conducted so long ago, some ppts may have been distracted.
Explain Millers research into memory chunking & provide a weakness
Suggests the capacity of the STM is about 7 items. However he noted that people can recall 5 letters aswell as 5 numbers which is known as chunking
❌ May have overestimated the capacity. Cowen found the capacity was around 4 chunks not 5. His research may be invalid
Explain research into stm duration
Peterson & Peterson tested 24 undergraduates who each took part in 6 trials. Given a consonant trigram and a 3 digit number. PPT had to count backwards from the number until told to stop which prevented the rehearsal of the trigram, used different time intervals of 3,6,9,12,15,18 secs then had to recall the consonants. Findings : overall performance was worse when ppt had to recall backwards from 18 secs
Evaluate Peterson&Peterson’s research
✅ Replicable
❌ Artificial material, trying to memorise consonant syllables does not reflect most real life memory activities
Explain research into LTM duration
Bahrik wanted to show memory could last over several decades. 392 American ex high school students ages 17-74’s recall was tested through
1. free recall as many names as possible 2. photo recognition test asked to identify set of 50 photos 3. name recognition test 4. name and photo matching test
Findings : ppts who were tested within 15 years of graduation were 90% accurate. After 45 years it declined to 80% for name recognition and 70% for photo recognition.
Evaluate Bahrik’s research into duration
✅ ecological validity - remembering core people from school is real life meaningful material. Past research on the LTM has found recall rates lower with meaningless material
❌ Some variables are not controlled as ppts may have previously looked at their year book photo’s
