paper one - memory Flashcards
what is the difference and definition of long and short term memory
STM- events in presence or immediate past LTM - events that have happened in the more distant past distinguished in terms of their capacity, duration and coding
what is the capacity of the STM
Jacobs - assessed using digit span , 9.3 digits and 7.3 letters , suggested as there are only 9 digits and 26 letters miller - magic number (7 plus or minus 2) for items
explain one criticism of miller’s magic number
Cowan found it was limited to 4 chunks, research on the capacity of STM for visual information (rather than verbal) also found 4 items Suggests that STM may not be extensive as was thought
individual differences eg. age and gender
explain how the size of chunks of information matter with STM capacity
Simon found people had a shorter memory span for larger chunks than smaller chunks This continues to support the view that the STM has a limited capacity and refines our understanding
explain the problem with individual differences within STM capacity
Jacobs found that recall (digit span) increased steadily with age eg. 8 year olds can remember 6.6 digits on average and 19 year olds can remember 8.6 digits - this suggests that the capacity of STM is not fixed and individual processes may play a role
what is the duration of the LTM
limitless
what is the capacity of the LTM
limitless
explain the duration of the STM
peterson and peterson 24 p’s and 8 trials each on each trial the p was given 3 numbers and 3 consonants eg. THX 567 asked to recall consonants after a duration period of 3,6,9,12,15,18 seconds during duration period they had to count back in threes from their 3 digit number on average were 90% after 3 seconds and only 2% correct after 18 - suggests STM has a very short duration of less than 18 seconds and as long verbal rehearsal is prevented
This doesnt reflect on everyday activites, however sometimes we do have to try remember eg. phone numbers
explain research into LTM with duration
test 400 ps on yearbook recognition test, tested after 15 years and 90% correct
what is coding
information has to be stored and written in some form, described as a ‘code’. sound = acoustic images = visual meaning = semantic
explain acoustic and semantic problems
-words can be acoustically similar but semantically different eg. cat cab and can -words can be semantically similar but acoustically different eg. large big and giant Baddeley found p’s had difficulty remembering acoustically similar in STM and semantic caused issue in LTM STM is largely encoded acoustically and LTM is semantically
explain the issues with baddeley’s coding experiment
STM was tested by asking straight away to recall LTM was tested after 20 mins - questioned if this is really testing LTM Also research highlights examples that the LTM may not be exclusively semantic
explain the multi-store model of memory
(Richard Atkinson)
consists of three main stores : the sensory memory, the short term memory and the long term memory
The sensory store - sensory info (from eyes etc) enters, large capacity however only 2 second before decay, if attended to (attention) moves to the STM.
Short term store: 18-30 second duration, 7+- capacity, if rehersed a lot will move to LTM, if not decay or displacement
Long term store: potentially unlimited capacity and duration
Both STM and LTM are unitary
what is retrieval
The process of getting info from the LTM back into the STM
usually happens because of cues
name strengths to the MSM
1) controlled lab studies on capcity, duration and coding support the existence of a seperate short and long term memory which is the basis of the MSM eg. Beardsley found that the prefrontal cortex is active during STM but not LTM
2) psychologists have shown the STM and LTM being seperate with brain damaged p’s (HM removed hippocampus) he couldnt form new LTM but he could remember things before surgery. supports notion of them being seperate stores, couldnt do STM to LTM but could retrieve from LTM
research support : Glanzer and Cunitz
p’s given words one at a time and asked to recall the words in any order, Ps remembered more words from the start of the list because they had more time to rehearse them so they had moved to LTM, words at end of list were still in STM as had not decayed yet, this supports MSM as shows they are unitary stores
explain limitations to the MSM
1) The MSM is too simple, the MSM explains STM and LTM as unitary stores, however research doesnt support this. Research shows a number of qualitively different types of LTM and same with STM stores for the kind of memory stored there
2) Long-term memory invloves more than maintenance rehersal which the MSM focuses so much on. research showed p’s remembering more words with deep processing compared to shallow highlighting ‘deep’ processing is also part of the process not just rehersal
3) The MSM suggests STM is involved before LTM, this has been questioned by other researches, research highlights STM relies on LTM and therefore can not come ‘first’ implying STM is actuallt just a part of LTM and not a seperate store.
describe the working memory model
central executive - direct attention to particular tasks, allocates brain’s resources to tasks. data arrives from the senses or from long-term memory, CE very limited capacity
Phonological loop- limited capacity, deals with auditory info and preserves order of info, Baddeley divided it further into 1) phonological store which holds the words you hear and 2) articulatory process which is used for words that are heard or seen.These words are silently repeated as a form of maintenance rehersal.
Visuo-spatial sketchpad - used when you have to plan a spatial task (Spatial ability or visuo-spatial ability is the capacity to understand, reason, and remember the spatial relations among objects or space. eg. getting from one room to another). Visual or spatial info temporarily stored here, Logie divided it into: 1) visual cache = info about visual objects 2) inner scribe stores arrangement of objects in the visual field
episodic buffer- general store, extra storage for info that relates to visual and acoustic info, limited capacity. The EB integrates info from the CE, PL and VSS. maintains a sense of time sequencing , recording events (episodes) that are having. sends info to LTM
explain dual performance with the WMM
main reason for developing was to account for dual performance. (you can do two tasks which are different eg. one involves sound and other is visual without damage to performance)
- Hitch and Baddeley suppoted this and existence in one study, task 1 occupied the CE, task 2 either occupied articulatory loop or both CE and AL
- task 1 was slower when task 2 involved CE and AL
- demonstrates dual performance and CE is part of the WMM
explain evidence from brain damaged patients for the WMM
shallice and warrington, studied a man called KF whos short term forgetting was much greater in auditory info than visual stimuli. his auditory problems were limited to verbal material eg. numbers and letters but not meaningful sounds eg. phone ringing, brain damage only to phonological loop
SC patient, good learning abilities with exception of learning word pairs read out loud, suggests damage to PL
LH, road accident, performed better of spatial tasks than visual imagery
supports the idea of the seperate visual and spatial systems as suggested by WMM
what are the problems of using brain damaged p’s as evidence
process of brain injury is traumatic, may in itself change behaviour so p performs worse of certain tasks
individuals may have other difficulties such as paying attention, therefore underperform on certain tasks.
case studies are unique individuals and we can not generalise for everyone.
issue for WWM as much research evidence is case studies
explain evidence for phonological loop and articulartory process
strength to the WWM is the phonological loop and its explanation for the word length effect, the fact people cope better with short term words than long words.
-holds amount of information that you can say in two words (baddeley), easier to remember a list of short words like cat and dog than longer words. The longer words cant be rehearsed as they dont fit, however this isnt the case if the p is asked to say “the” before the word as it ties up the articulatory process and cant rehearse the shorter words quicker than the longer ones.
This is evidence for the articulatory process. a key component
explain the issue of the central executive being too vague
- appears to only allocate resouces and essentially is the same as ‘attention’
- the notion of a single central execuative is wrong and there are probably several components. Eslinger and Damasio studied a p with cerebral tumour removed, he performed well on tests which required reasoning (CE intact) but had poor decision-making skills (CE not intact)
propbably more complex than Baddeley and Hitch originally suggested
