Unit 2 - Memory Flashcards
Who created the multi-store model?
Atkinson and Shiffrin
What did Atkinson and Shiffrin suggest?
That the memory had 3 stores ; sensory register, short-term memory and long-term memory
What is sensory memory?
is information you get from your senses
Describes the steps in the multi-store memory
1 - information gained from senses enters the sensory register
2 - if info is paid attention to its converted into the short-term memory
3 - if the info is not important it either decays or disappears.
4 - once in STM the information is rehearsed
5 - and then passed in LTM
What is the definition for encoding?
is the way information is changed so that it can be stored in the memory. There are three ways ;
- visual (picture)
- acoustic (sound)
- semantic (meaning).
What is the definition for capacity?
concerns how much information can be stored
What is the definition for duration?
refers to the period of time information can last in the memory stores
What is the capacity, duration and encoding type for the sensory register?
capacity ; all sensory experience
duration ; 1/4 to 1/2 second
encoding ; sense specific
What is the capacity, duration and encoding type for the short-term memory?
capacity ; 7 + / - 2 items
duration ; 18 - 30 seconds
encoding ; acoustic
What is the capacity, duration and encoding type for the
capacity ; unlimited
duration ; unlimited
encoding : semantic
What did Glanzer and Cunitz show?
that when participants are presented with a list of words, they remember the first few and last few and are more likely to forget the ones in the middle.
What is the key term for the Glanzer and Cunitz to show what they found?
serial position effect
Why is it that people remember the first and last few words?
Words early on in the list were put into long term memory (primacy effect) because the person has time to rehearse the word, and words from the end went into short term memory (recency effect).
What are the 3 types of long term memory?
episodic
semantic
procedural
What is procedural long term memory?
is part of the LTM which is responsible for knowing how to do things.
- its unconscious
What is sematic long term memory?
is part of the LTM responsible for storing information about the world. This includes the knowledge about the meaning of words, as well as general knowledge
What is episodic long term memory?
is the part of the LTM responsible for storing information about events that we have experienced in life
Who created the working memory model?
Baddeley and Hitch
What are the features in the working memory model?
central executive phonological loop episodic buffer visuospatial sketch pad long-term knowledge system
What is the central executive?
filters information
determines which information is attended to
What is the phonological loop?
temporary storage system for holding auditory information
split into 2 parts ;
1 - phonological store (inner ear), which stores words you hear
2 - the articulatory process (inner voice) allows maintenance rehearsal
What is the visuospatial sketchpad?
temporary memory system for holding visual and spatial information.
split into 2 parts ;
1 - the visual cache (stores visual data about colour and form)
2 - the inner scribe (records arrangement of objects in visual field, and rehearses and transfers information in visual cache to central executive
What is the episodic buffer?
acts as ‘backup’ (temporary) store for information which communicates with both long term and short term memory
What are the 2 types of interference
retroactive
proactive
What is interference?
is an explanation of forgetting things from long term memory
What is proactive interference?
pro = forward
is where old learning prevents recall of more recent information
What is retroactive interference?
retro = backward
is where new learning prevents recall of previously learned information
What was the study which investigated the duration of the STM?
peterson and peterson using nonsense trigrams
What was the method of the Peterson and Peterson study?
- participants were shown nonsense trigrams
- asked to recall them after either 3, 6, 9, 12, 15 or 18 seconds
- during the pause they had to count backwards in threes from a given number.
- this was an interference task which prevented rehearsal
What were the results of the Peterson and Peterson study?
after 3 seconds, participants could recall 80% of trigrams correctly
after 18 seconds, only 10% was recalled correctly
What is the conclusion for the Peterson and Peterson study?
when rehearsal is prevented very little can stay in the STM for longer than 18 seconds
What are the strengths of the Peterson and Peterson study?
lab study - reliable results, because the variables can be tightly controlled
What are the weaknesses of the Peterson and Peterson study?
- lack of ecological validity - trigrams are artificial.
- Meaningful memories are more likely to stay in STM for longer.
- only one stimulus was used - duration of STM may depend on type of stimulus
- participants saw many types of trigrams - caused confusion. The first trigram was the only realistic trial
What was the study which investigated LTM?
Bahrick et al
What was the method of Bahrick’s study?
- 392 people were asked to list names of their ex-classmates (free-recall test)
- they were shown pictures and asked to recall names (photo-recognition test)
- or given the names and asked to match them to a photo (name-recognition test)
What were the results of Bahrick’s study?
- within 15 years of leaving school, participants could recognise 90% of names and faces.
- 60% accurate on free-recall test
- after 30 years free recall declined to 30%
- after 48 years name-recognition was about 80% accurate and photo-recognition about 40%
What was the conclusion of Bahrick’s study?
gives evidence of very long-term memories in a real-life setting. Recognition is better than recall, not easy to access all information, just need help to get to it
What are the strengths of the Bahrick’s study?
high ecological validity - field experiment
What are the weaknesses of the Bahrick’s study?
field experiment - hard to control all the variables, making findings less reliable
cant be generalised - can be rehearsed by still being in touch with classmates, which increases the rate of recall.
What is the study that investigated capacity of STM?
Jacobs
What was the method of the Jacobs study?
- participants were presented with a string of letters or digits.
- asked to repeat them back in the same sequence
- the number of digits and letters increased until the participant failed to recall the sequence correctly
What were the results of the Jacobs study?
majority of the time participants recalled about 9 digits and 7 letters
What was the conclusion of the Jacobs study?
- STM had a limited storage capacity of 5-9 items
- individual differences changed it, like STM increasing with age, possibly due to memory techniques such as chunking.
What were the weaknesses of the Jacobs study?
lacks ecological validity - not something you do in real life.Meaningful information may be recalled better, perhaps showing STM to have a larger capacity
What did Milner do?
reviewed research into capacity of STM
What did Milner find?
- people can recall up to seven items, seven +/- 2
- people use chunking to make individual letters and digits more meaningful
What did Baddeley investigate?
coding in STM and LTM
What was the method of the Baddeley study?
- participants were given four sets of words which were all acoustically similar, acoustic dissimilar, semantically similar and semantically dissimilar
- experiments used independent groups design
- participants were asked to recall the words immediately or following a 20-minute task
What were the results of the Baddeley study?
- participants had trouble recalling acoustically similar words when recalling the word list immediately (from STM).
- if recalling after an interval (from LTM), they had problems with semantically similar words
What were the conclusions of the Baddeley study?
the patterns of confusion between similar words suggest LTM is more likely to rely on semantic coding and STM acoustic coding
What were the weaknesses of the Baddeley study?
- lacks ecological validity
- there are other types of LTM e.g episodic, procedural memory and other coding (visual), which this experiment does not consider
- used independent groups - no control over participants variables
What are the 4 studies which support the multi-store model?
primacy effect
recency effect
people with Korsakoff’s syndrome
Milner et al
What is the primacy effect study?
research shows that people are able to recall the first few items of a list better than those in middle.
What is the recency effect study?
people remember the last few items better than those from the middle. As STM can hold around 7 items, the words in the middle are not rehearsed, and are displaced from STM by last few words.
What is the people with Korsakoff’s syndrome study?
Korsakoff syndrome is amnesia caused by chronic alcoholism.
can recall the last items in a list suggesting an unaffected STM. However, their LTM is very poor. This supports the model by showing that STM and LTM are seperate stores
What is the Milner et al study?
- carried out a case study into patient called HM who had suffered from epilepsy.
- His seizures were based in a brain structure called the hippocampus.
- doctor removed part of the brain around it
- this reduced his epilepsy but led to memory loss
- could still form short term memories, but unable to form new long-term memories.
- this supports the idea that different types of memory are separate systems in brain
How does the multi-store model explain the primacy effect study?
because earlier items will have been rehearsed better and transferred to LTM. If rehearsal is prevented by interference task, the effect disappears
What are the limitations of the multi-store model?
- in the model, information is transferred from the STM to LTM through rehearsal. But in real life people don’t spend time rehearsing, yet they still transfer information.
- model is oversimplified. It assumes there is only one long term store and one short term store. This has been disproved by evidence from brain damage studies, suggesting several different STM stores and different LTM stores
What are the strengths of the working memory model?
- Shallice and Warrington study
- Gathercole and Baddeley study
- model has less emphasis on rehearsal than the multi-store model of memory. Rather than being the key process, rehearsal is just one possible process in this model.
What was the Shallice and Warrington study?
Did a case study of KF
- KF was a brain damaged patient who had an impaired STM.
- he couldn’t immediately recall words which were presented verbally, but not with visual information.
- this suggested he had a faulty articulatory loop but an intact visuo-spatial sketchpad, which provides evidence for model
What is the Gathercole and Baddeley study?
- participants were split into 2 groups
- all had to carry out task where they had to follow a moving spot of light, used the visuo-spatial sketchpad.
- at the same time, one group had to describe the angle of letter - another task involving the visuo-spatial sketchpad
- the other group had a second task that would use the phonological loop - verbal task whilst following light
They found that participants were much better doing separate tasks
What are the weaknesses of the working memory model?
criticisms from people ;
- Baddeley and Hitch’s idea of a central executive is simplistic and vague.
- model only explains how information is dealt with in STM, does explain how information is transferred to LTM
- much of the research into the working memory model are lab studies. This reduces the ecological validity of the evidence
What is the definition of forgetting?
when learnt information can’t be retrieved
What can cause forgetting in the STM?
limited capacity
limited duration
could of cause the information to displaced (pushed out) or decayed (faded away)
What are the strengths of the interference theory?
- proactive and retroactive interference are supported , many of which are lab studies
- there is evidence for proactive and retroactive interference in the real life
What are the weaknesses of the interference theory?
- theory gives an explanation for why we forget, but doesnt go into the cognitive or biological processes involved - doesn’t fully explain why or how interference happens
What helps recall?
cues
What is eyewitness testimony?
is the evidence provided by people who witnessed a particular event or crime. It relies on recall from memoru
What is the problem with eyewitness testimonies?
can be inaccurate and distorted
What did Loftus and Palmer investigate?
how eyewitness testimony can be distorted.
they did 2 experiment
What did Loftus and Palmer use and why?
leading questions where a certain answer is implied to the question
What was the method for the first experiment Loftus and Palmer did?
- participants were shown a clips of a car crashes
- they were asked a series of questions including how fast do you think the cars were going when hit?
- in different conditions they used, the word ‘hit’ was replaced with smashed, collided, bumped or contacted
What were the results for the first experiment Loftus and Palmer did?
- participants given the word ‘smashed’ estimated the highest speed (an average of 41 mph)
- those given the word ‘contacted’ gave the lowest estimate (an average of 32 mph)
What was the method for the second experiment Loftus and Palmer did?
- participants were split into 3 groups
- one given the verb ‘smashed’
- another ‘hit’
- and the third control group wasn’t given any indications of the vehicles speed
- a week later the groups were asked did you see any broken glass
What were the results for the second experiment Loftus and Palmer did?
although there was no broken glass in the film, participants were more likely to say that they’d seen glass in the ‘smashed’ condition
What was the conclusion from Loftus and Palmer studies?
leading questions can affect the accuracy of people’s memories of an event
What are the strengths of Loftus and Palmer’s study?
- implications for police interviews
What are the weaknesses of Loftus and Palmer’s study
- artificial experiment - watching a video is not as emotionally arousing as in real life, which potentially affects recall. This is supported by a study of real life robberies where people who witnessed were able to give an accurate description.
- experimental design lead to demand characteristics - which reduced the validity and reliability of the experiment
What did Loftus and Zanni investigate ?
how altering the wording of a question can produce a leading question (that can distort EWT)
What is the method for Loftus and Zanni’s study?
- participants were shown a film of a car crash.
- then asked either ‘Do you see the broken headlight?’ or ‘Did you see a broken headlight?’
- there was no broken headlight in film
What were the results of the Loftus and Zanni study?
17% of those asked about ‘the’ broken headlight claimed they saw one
7% in the other group
What was the conclusion of Loftus and Zanni study?
the use of the word ‘the’ is enough to affect the accuracy of people’s memories of an event
What are the strengths of the Loftus and Zanni study?
- lab study - made it possible to control extraneous variables
What are the weaknesses of the Loftus and Zanni study?
- study was artificial - lacked ecological validity
What else can affect the accuracy of recall?
Post-event discussion
What were the 2 studies which showed the effect of post-event discussion?
Shaw et al
Gabber et al
What was the method for Shaw et all study?
- participants were paired with a confederate (who pretended to be another participant).
- the pairs were shown videos of a staged robbery and were interviewed together afterwards.
- the participant and confederate alternated who answered questions first.
What were the results of the Shaw et al study?
when the participant responded first, recall was accurate 58% of the time
when the confederate answered first and gave accurate answers, the recall of the participants was 67%.
if the confederate gave inaccurate answers, correct recall fell to 42%
What was the method for Gabbert et all study?
- two groups of participants - young adults (17-33 year old) and older adults (50-80 year old).
- both groups watched a staged crime and were then exposed to misleading information in one of two ways ;
1 - through conversation with a confederate who was pretending to be another participant
2 - or a written report of the crime - participant then given a recall test about the event they witnessed
What were the results of the Gabbert et al study?
both groups of adults were more likely to report inaccurate information after a conversation with a confederate than after reading the report
What things that can affect the accuracy of the eyewitness test?
age of the witness
Which study showed that age affects eyewitness tests?
Valentine and Coxon
What was the method of the Valentine and Coxon study?
- 3 groups of participants (children, young adults and elderly people
- watched a video of a kidnapping
- they were asked a series of leading and non-leading questions about what they had seen
What were the results of the Valentine and Coxon study?
both the elderly and children gave more incorrect answers to non-leading questions
children were misled more by leading questions the most
What are the advantages of the Valentine and Coxon study?
implications in law when elderly people and children are questioned
What are the disadvantages of the Valentine and Coxon study?
lacks ecological validity - experiment artificial - wasn’t as emotionally arousing as if it was in real-life
What affects focus?
anxiety
What are the impacts of anxiety on accuracy of memory?
small increases and arousal may increase the accuracy of memory, but high levels have a negative effect on accuracy
Who did the weapon focus study in EWT?
Loftus
What is the method of Loftus’s study?
independent groups
- participants heard a discussion in a nearby room
- in one condition, a man came out with a pen and grease on his hands
- in the second condition, man came out with a knife covered in blood
- participants were asked to identify the man from 50 photos
What were the results of Loftus’s study?
participants in condition 1 were 49% accurate
only 33% of the participants in condition 2 were accurate
What was the conclusion of Loftus’s study?
when anxious and aroused, witness focus on weapon at the expense of other details
What are the advantages of Loftus’s study?
high ecological validity - participants weren’t aware that the study was staged
What are the disadvantages of Loftus’s study?
ethical considerations - participants were distressed at the man with the knife
What was created to increase accuracy of EWT?
the cognitive interview
What happens in cognitive interviews?
1 - the interviewer tries to make the witness relaxed and tailors language to suit
2 - the witness mentally recreates the environment context and internal context of the crime scene
3 - the witness reports everything that they remember
4 - the witness is asked to recall details in a different orders
5 - the witness is asked to recall the event from different perspectives
6 - the interviewer avoids any judgemental and personal comments
What is the research to support cognitive interview?
Geiselmen
What was the method of Geiselmen’s study?
independent groups
- stage situation - an intruder carrying a blue rucksack entered a classroom and stole a projector.
- 2 days later participants were questioned
- participants were either questioned using standard interview or cognitive interview technique
- early in questioning participants were asked “ was the guy in the green backpack nervous?” later in the interview they were asked what colour it was
What were the results of Geiselmen’s study?
participants in cognitive interview condition were less likely to recall the rucksack being green than those in standard interview
What are the advantages of Geiselmen’s study?
high ecological validity - experiment conducted as though a real life crime
What are the disadvantages of Geiselmen’s study?
independent groups - participants in the cognitive interview condition could have been naturally less susceptible to leading questions that other group (individual differences)
What are the studies which supports the Working Memory Model?
Baddeley and Hitch (dual task)
KF case study
What is the dual task study ?
participants were asked to do two different tasks at the same time
What were the findings of the dual task study?
It is easier to do two tasks at the same time if they use different processing systems (verbal and visual) than if they use the same slave system.
What are the 3 types of retrieval cues?
context
state
organisation
What are context cues?
external cues in the environment e.g smell, place
What are state cues?
bodily cues inside of us e.g physical, mood
What are organisation cues?
recall is improved if the organisation gives a structure which provides triggers, eg categories.
What is the study which shows retrieval failure?
Scuba diving (Godden and Baddeley)
What are the advantages of the Loftus and Palmer misleading information study?
- application to police interview - the use of cognitive interview which increases the accuracy of eyewitnesses recall - as it gets them to report everything. However a negative of cognitive interview is due to the cost of training the staff and the time consumed
What are the disadvantages of the Loftus and Palmer misleading information study?
- because the study is a lab study - it lacks internal validity and mundane realism - this is because there is no anxiety provoking anxiety stimulus which would be in a real life criminal event - anxiety is also seen to increase the accuracy of recall. Also, there would be individual differences as its a lab study e.g age. Age causes recall to be worse
