Models of memory Flashcards
What three parts can the multi store model of memory be divided into?
Sensory memory
Short term memory
Long term memory
What is sensory memory? What type of info is it? Decays? Capacity? Duration?
A form of awareness. Raw information. Limited in capacity. Decays. Lasts a few seconds.
What does Sperlings study show?
19…
1960
Information is processed by your sensory memory for a very brief period of time at a sub conscious level.
If the information is processed it’s passed into our STM
What are the characteristics of our short term memory? Capacity Duration Encoding Decays?
It has a capacity of 7+/- 2 items of information.
Lasts 15-30 seconds.
STM is processed acoustically.
Decays or is displaced.
What are the characteristics of our long term memory?
Capacity?
Duration?
Encoding?
Lasts up to a lifetime
Is never lost
Unlimited capacity
Is stored mostly semantically.
What was Sperlings experiment?
1960
Presented letter grids for a fraction of a second and then asked participants to recite them.
Showed that SM didn’t last very long.
When letters were flashed up with sounds they recalled more.
Showed that it’s processed at a sub conscious level once triggered more can be remembered.
What was Jacobs research?
1887
Presented pps with a string of letters making sure no link could be made, most people could recall the maximum of 7 items.
What was Millers study?
1956
Chunking helps increase the capacity of our STM by stringing information together using our LTM.
K F C etc.
What was the conclusion of Peterson and Petersons study?
Over time memory fades the longer a distraction occurs the less that is remembered.
What is encoding?
The way we change information to a form it can be stored e.g acoustic, semantic or visual.
What was the conclusion of Baddeleys study concerning the STM?
When asked to recite the lists mistakes were made which shows STM is processed and stored acoustically because when something has meaning we think more so are less likely to make a mistake.
Cat bat sat etc.
What was the conclusion of Baddeleys research concerning LTM?
LTM is processed and stored semantically.
Large huge enormous… Etc.
What is capacity?
This is how much information can be stored.
What is duration?
Duration refers to the period of time that information can last in the memory stores.
What is the primacy effect?
Research shows that participants are able to recall items at the start of a list better than those from the middle.
How does the MSM explain the primacy effect?
The multi store model explains this because earlier items will have been rehearsed better and transferred to the LTM. If rehearsal is prevented by an interference task, the effect disappears as the model predicts.
What is the recency effect?
Pps tend to remember the last few items of a list better than those from the middle of the list.
How does the MSM explain the recency effect?
Earlier items are rehearsed so transfer to LTM, whilst later items are recalled because they’re still in STM.
What is Korsakoff’s syndrome and how does it support the MSM model?
Korsakoff’s syndrome is amnesia that is mostly caused by chronic alcoholism. It can support the model as people with KS can recall the last items suggesting an unaffected STM but their LTM is very poor. This shows that they’re different stores.
What are limitations of the MSM?
- In the model information is transferred from the STM to LTM through rehearsal which people don’t always spend time on in real life.
- Some items can’t be rehearsed (eg smell)
- The model is over simplified.
Who created the multi store model of memory?
Atkinson & Shiffrin
What does the multi store model of memory consist of?
The sensory store
The short term store
The long term store
