Memory: topic 1 ‘features of STM and LTM’

Question 1

What is short term memory?

Answer 1

• a temporary store for information

Question 2

How does information enter the short term memory store?

Answer 2

• if we have paid attention to info in the sensory register (maintenance rehearsal), it will be sent to short term memory

Question 3

How is information lost from the short term memory store?

Answer 3

• displacement or decay

Question 4

What is long term memory?

Answer 4

• a memory store that stores information over lengthy periods of time

Question 5

How does information enter the long term memory store?

Answer 5

• through elaborative rehearsal

Question 6

How is information lost from the long term memory store?

Answer 6

• retrieval failure or interference

Question 7

What is capacity?

Answer 7

• how much information the store can hold

Question 8

What is duration?

Answer 8

• how long a memory can be held for

Question 9

What is coding?

Answer 9

• the way information is transformed into a format that can be stored and retrieved from memory (eg visual, acoustic, semantic)

Question 10

What is the capacity and duration of short term memory?

Answer 10

• capacity: 5-9 items
• duration: 18-30 seconds

Question 11

How did Miller use the digit span technique to prove the short term memory has a limited capacity?

Answer 11

• he used the digit span technique which is a series of digits that get progressively longer
• the participant is asked to IMMEDIATELY repeat the digits back in order
• Miller found that participants on average could recall 5-9 items
• he also found that the capacity of the stm can be increased by chunking

Question 12

What is the capacity and duration of long term memory?

Answer 12

• capacity: unlimited
• duration: up to a life time

Question 13

How did Bahrick use the free recall test to prove the long term memory has an unlimited duration?

Answer 13

• he asked 392 participants aged 17-24 to name old classmates from highschool
• they were then given 50 photos and asked if they could recall their names
• they found that 15 years after graduation, free recall was about 60% accurate, but after 48 years this dropped to 30%
• recognition was 90% accurate after 15 years but only 70% after 48 years
• this suggests ltm could have a potentially unlimited duration and that even if a long term memory cannot be freely recalled, this does not mean it is no longer stored, it may just need assistance to be

Question 14

What coding is used in short term memory?

Answer 14

• acoustic (sound)

Question 15

How did Baddeley use word lists to prove the coding of short term memory was acoustic?

Answer 15

• participants were presented with a list of words that were acoustically similar (eg cat cab can) and asked for immediate recall
• these participants made more errors than they did when presents with a list of acoustically different words (eg pit few cow)
• he concluded that this was because there was confusion based on the way words sounded
• this suggests that stm encodes information acoustically

Question 16

What coding is used in long term memory?

Answer 16

• semantic (meaning)

Question 17

How did Baddeley use word lists to prove the coding of long term memory was semantic?

Answer 17

• participants were presented with a list of words that were semantically similar (eg great big large) and asked for recall 20 minutes later
• these participants made more errors than they did when presents with a list of semantically different words (eg good huge hot)
• he concluded that this was because there was confusion based on the meaning of words
• this suggests that ltm encodes information semantically