Multi-Store Model of Memory

Question 1

Outline the muti-store model of memory (MSM)

Answer 1

• Atkinson and Shiffrin proposed the multi-store as it consists of 3 memory stores linked to each other by processes that enable transfer of information from one store to the next
• (environmental stimuli) –> Sensory memory (attention) —>
  Short-term memory (maintenance rehearsal) —> Long-term memory <— (retrieval)

Question 2

Describe the sensory register

Answer 2

• The place where information is held at each of the senses and the corresponding areas of the brain.
• Is divided into different stores, iconic memory hold visual info and echoic memory holds acoustic info.
• Coding: modality specific, each store holds specific info
• Duration: sensory info lasts only around 250 milliseconds.
• Capacity: large

Question 3

What is attention?

Answer 3

If someone’s attention is focused on one of the memory stores, then the data is transferred to short-term memory. Attention is the first step in remembering something

Question 4

Describe short-term memory

Answer 4

• Information is held in STM so it can be used for immediate tasks.
• Coded acoustically: that inner voice
• Capacity: around 5-9 items of info (7 +- 2)
• Duration: 18-30 seconds unless rehearsed (maintenance rehearsal), rehearsal means it passes to long-term memory

Question 5

Describe long-term memory

Answer 5

• Coded semantically
• Capacity and duration is potentially unlimited
• In order to remember something we retrieve it from out LTM back into our STM

Question 6

Give evaluation for the MSM (supporting evidence)

Answer 6

• Studies using brain scanning techniques have supported that there’s a difference between STM and LTM.
• Beardsley found the prefrontal cortex is active during STM but not LTM tasks. Squire at al found the hippocampus is active when LTM is engaged.
• Provides support for STM and LTM as seperate stores

Question 7

Give evaluation for the MSM (case study support)

Answer 7

• Scoville and Milner found that in a man (HM) whose hippocampus was removed to reduce the severe epilepsy he had suffered. HM’s personality and intellect remained intact but he couldn’t form new LTMs, but could remember things from before surgery.
• Supports the MSM’s notion of separate stores as HM couldn’t transfer information from his STM to LTM, but was able to retrieve information from before his surgery.

Question 8

Give evaluation for the MSM (emphasis on maintenance rehearsal)

Answer 8

• The MSM may place too much emphasis on maintenance rehearsal in the creation of LTM
• Craik and Tulving gave participants a list of nouns and asked a question involving shallow or deep processing. Participants remembered more words in the task involving deep processing rather than shallow processing.
• Suggests rehearsal doesn’t fully explain the creation of long-term memories, and the role of deeper processing may be more important

Question 9

Give evaluation for the MSM (simplistic)

Answer 9

• Shallice and Warrington studied a man called KF, whose short-term forgetting of auditory info was much greater than of that of visual stimuli. In addition his auditory problems were limited to verbal material, like letters and digits but not meaningful sounds (phone ringing).
• Suggests that the STM isn’t a unitary store (acoustically) as the MSM suggests.