Multi-Store Memory Model

Question 1

Multi-store memory model (MSM)

Answer 1

A representation of how memory works in terms of three stores: sensory register, short-term memory and long-term memory.

Question 2

Stimulus from the environment

Answer 2

Enters sensory register. There is a register for each of the 5 senses.

Question 3

Iconic sensory register

Answer 3

Visual/sight information. Coding is visual.

Question 4

Echoic sensory register

Answer 4

Sound information. Coding is acoustic.

Question 5

Other sensory stores

Answer 5

Very high capacity

Question 6

Short-term memory

Answer 6

• Coded acoustically
• Lasts about 18 seconds unless rehearsed
• Temporary and limited capacity store (Miller’s 7+/-2 items OR Cowan’s 5 items)
• Maintenance rehearsal occurs when we repeat material to ourselves over and over.

Question 7

Long-term memory

Answer 7

• Potentially permanent memory store for information that has been rehearsed.
• LTM is generally coded semantically.
• Duration may last a lifetime.
• When we recall info from LTM it has to be transferred back into the STM by a process called retrieval.

Question 8

The case study of HM- supporting evidence for MSM

Answer 8

• Supports central feature of the model (that there are 2 separate and independent memory stores).
• What happened to HM is proof that it is possible to sustain damage to one of these stores with the other remaining relatively unaffected.
• HM’s LTM was badly damaged. He had no memory for events that happened just hours or even minutes earlier. His LTM never improved with practice either.
• His STM was much less badly affected.
• Clinical psychologists call this difference in performance a dissociation.

Question 9

Tim Shallice and Elizabeth Warrington (1970)

Answer 9

• studied a client with amnesia known as KF.
• KF’s STM for digits was very poor when they were read aloud to him, however, his recall was much better when he read the digits for himself.
• Therefore, there could be a STM store for non-verbal sounds (noises).
• This evidence suggests that the MSM is wrong in claiming that there is just one STM store processing different types of information.

Question 10

Elaborative Rehearsal

Answer 10

• Prolonged rehearsal is not needed for transfer to LTM.
• Fergus Craik and Michael Watkins (1973) found that the type of rehearsal is more important than the amount.
• Elaborative rehearsal is when you link the information to your existing knowledge.

Question 11

Atkinson and Sheffrin

Answer 11

• based their research on evidence that was available to them at the time (STM and LTM)- at the same time they were thought to be single memory stores and independent from each other.
• There is now a lot of evidence that LTM and STM are not single memory store.
• Because of the research showing there is more than one type of STM and more than one type of rehearsal, the MSM is an oversimplified model of memory.