WMM

Question 1

Who created the WMM and what year was it published?

What was the models aim?

Answer 1

Baddeley and Hitch in 1974

To go into more detail about how the STM works

Question 2

What are the four stores in the working model memory?

Answer 2

• Central Executive
• Phonological Loop
• Visuo-Spatial Sketchpad
• Episodic buffer (2000)

Question 3

What is the role of the Central Executive

Answer 3

‘The Boss’

No storage capacity, supervises and coordinates a number of subsidiary systems, directs attention to particular tasks

Question 4

What is the role of the Phonological Loop

Answer 4

Phonological Store : ‘inner ear’ - keeps acoustic memories but they rapidly decay
Articulatory Control System : ‘inner voice’ - allows subvocal repetition of items in the Phonological Store, this is a form of maintenance rehearsal

Question 5

What is the role of the Visuo-spatial sketchpad

Answer 5

‘Inner eye’ - used when you have to mentally plan a spatial task
Responsible for setting up and manipulating mental images
Visual Cache : stores information about shape and colour
Inner Scribe : deals with spatial info and how to move, a rehearsal mechanism

Question 6

What is the role of the Episodic buffer

Answer 6

• A general store linking information from both - that can deal with different types of information
• binds information from different sources into chunks of episodes
• Integrates information from all components and prepares memories from the LTM
• Was added in 2000 because model needed general store

Question 7

Summarise evaluations of the WMM

Answer 7

• research to support -> Baddeley and Hitch dual task performance
• However research evidence comes from artificial lab experiments - low ecological validity
• theoretical flaws -> may still be too oversimplified
• useful practical applications