Multi store model Flashcards
Multi store model of memory
- Propsed by Atkinson and Shiffrin
- 1968
- Sensory memory–>short term memory–>long term memory
- All stores are unitary (independent to eachother)
- Damage to one memory store doesnt affect the other
- Theres only 1 type of long term, short term, and sensory memory store - It’s not split into subtypes
Coding
format in which information is stored
Capacity
amount of information that can be held in a memory store
Duration
the length of time information can be held in memory
Sensory register/memory
- Coding: mainly visual & acoustic- but can use all 5 senses
- Capacity: High
- Duration: Less than 1/2 a second
Short term memory
- Coding: auditory/acoustic
- Capacity: Between 5-9 items (7+/-2)
- Duration: 30 seconds
Long term memory
- Coding: Semantic
- Capacity: Unlimited
- Duration: Up to a life-time/permanent
Maintenance rehearsal
repeating information over and over again
* helps information go from short term memory to long term memory store
Retrieval
Information can be sent from the long term memory store to short term memory so you can speak about it
e.g exams
Evaluation
+ Contribution to psychological
+ Supported by research study
+Supported by reasearch study
+ Murdocks supportive evidence
- View on maintenance rehearsal
- KF
+ Bahrick et al
Contribution to psychological research
MSM has made an important contribution to memory research by enabling psychologists to test and further refine models of memory
Supported by research study
Research has shown that when ppts learn acoustically similar words (e.g cat, cab) and acoustically disimilar words (e.g pit, cloud), they tend to recall worse on acoustically similar words
* This is because STM is encoded acoustically
* Substitution error- people are likely to confuse a different item for a similar one on the list
* Ppts confused items that sound similar because the STM is using an acoustic code
* Supports Atkinson and Shiffrin that STM uses an auditory coding
Supported by research
In a study, ppts were asked to learn semantically similar words e.g large, big and semantically dissimilar words e.g good, sky. When asked to recall after 30 mins they did worse on the semantically similar words, because the LTM processes semantic information
Murdocks supportive evidence
SERIAL POSITION CURVE STUDY
* Murdock read his ppts a list of words that they had to recall in any order (free recall)
* Murdock found that words at the beginning and end of the list were recalled better.
* Words at the beginning were recalled (primacy effect) because they had been rehearsed and transferred to the LTM store
* Words at the end of the list were recalled (recency effect) because they were still in the STM store
* This provides support for the 2 seperate memory stores. Primary effect illustates the existence of the LTM and the recency effect illustates the existence of STM
- The study was a lab experiment so it lacks ecological validity. The experiment is artificial because it uses a list of words, that isnt true to everyday life
View on maintenance rehearsal
Maintenance rehearsal is not useful or enough to explain everyday memories. Its important for information to be transferred from the STM to the LTM in the model, but the finding arent enough to account for everyday memory
KF
Opposing evidence for the MSM by Shallice and Warrington (1970)
* Studied a patient with amnesia (KF), who developed the disease after a motorcycle accident
* His LTM was left intact
* His STM could only deal well with new visual information, but not new verbal information
* Suggets that** STM is split into subsections and cannot be a unitary store.** There must be one store that processes visual info and another to process auditory info
- It only uses 1 ppt, so it lacks population validity because results cannot be generalsied to the wider population because it uses a small sample size
Bahrick et al
- B. et al use 392 ppts from America (aged 17-74)
- Ppts were asked to recall the names of their graduating class
- Shown 50 photos as part of recognition task + also took part in free recall test
- Memory was better for ppt who were tested with 15 years of graduation, however recall was still good for older ppts too
- Ppts were able to recognise the names and faces of their school classmates almost 50 years after graduating
- Recall performance was better when a cue (photo) was given, than free recall
- Shows that LTM has a very long duration
