Psychology A1 - concept one - cognitive Flashcards
1. characteristics of three memory stores
duration: sensory memory
-first part of memory system, all stimuli pass into it
-five stores, one for each sense
-duration = brief
-example, information in visual store (iconic memory) lasts for less than half a second
capacity: sensory memory
-capacity = high
-example, 100 million cells in retina in each eye, each cells stores sensory data
encoding: sensory memory
-converting information from environment to form that can be stored in memory
-depends on sense
-example, iconic store is visual and echoic store is acoustic (received by ears)
duration: short-term memory (STM)
-temporary store
-information lasts up to 30 secs before it disappears (Peterson and Peterson 1959)
-stays in STM longer if repeated over and over (maintenance rehearsal)
-do rehearsal for long enough, pass into LTM
capacity: STM
-limited store
-can only contain a certain amount before forgetting
-Miller (1956), capacity = between 5 and 9 items of info, ‘magic number plus 7 or minus 2’
encoding: STM
-mainly acoustic (sounds)
-Baddeley (1966), when people recall words from list of immediately after hearing them, any mistakes = acoustic
-example, substituting a word with another that sounds the same
duration: long-term memory (LTM)
-potentially permanent store
-rehearsed for a prolonged time
-last up to a lifetime
-Bahrick et al, (1975), people could recognise names and faces of school classmates from 50 years ago
capacity: LTM
-practically unlimited
-store everything we have learned in it
-forget information, may still be there but can’ be accessed, don’t have right cues
encoding: LTM
-semantic (meaning)
-Baddeley (1966), mistakes in recalling words from LTM involved substituting a word that means the same thing
evaluation: Practical Applications (+)
-knowledge of memory stores has practical applications
-example, limited capacity of STM can be increased through chunking – CARDOGLITPENBUY, double average capacity of STM
-letters = organised: CAR, DOG etc.
-put letters into ‘bigger’ chunks’ means items to be stored = 5
-‘chunking approach’ is applied to vehicle registrations, post codes etc.
-shows how understanding the characteristics of stores can help improve memory
evaluation: research support (+)
-evidence showing that there are three memory stores with different characteristics
-duration studies: Peterson and Peterson, Bahrick etc. show this
-Sperling (1960), information in iconic memory store lasts for about 50 milliseconds
-many studies that show differences in capacity and encoding
-SM, STM and LTM are separate memory stores, differ so much in characteristic
evaluation: issues with research (-)
-lot of the research isn’t typical of everyday memory (outdated)
-example, pps in one study had to remember consonant syllables (‘YCG’), have no meaning (Peterson and Peterson, 1959)
-other studies used letters and digits, in everyday life, we form memories related to useful things – more meaningful than materials in studies
-means that the different characteristics of stores may not be so clear when we use our memories in everyday
