Cognitive approach - psychology

Themes and studies

Models of Memory

Multi-Store memory model (Atkinson and Shiffrin)- separate compartments for sensory, short-term, and long-term memory.

Attention needed to enter STM and rehearsal needed to enter LTM

Sensory memory - short duration, limited capacity (1-3 s) modality dependednt)

STM - short duration ( around 20 s without rehearsal), limited capacity 7 ± 2 units, (mostly auditory processed)

LTM - unlimited duration, unlimited capacity. Imformation can be retrieved back to STM if needed.

Study - Glanzer and Cunitz (1966)

Aim:investigate if Serial Positioning effect could be an explanation for two separate stores of memory

Serial Position effect included primacy effect which is when we remember the first piece of information the best and Recency effect is that we tend to remeber last piece of information the best whereas middle information is often forgotten

Participants: 46 males were separately shown 15 lists each containing 15 words. They were divided into 3 conditions

• Group 1: recall words immediately after seeing a list,

• Group 2 : recall words after 10 second interference task ( counting backwards)

• Group 3: recall words after 30 seconds interference task (also counting backwards)

The lists and orders of words were randomized so that each participants were presented different list of words.

Results : Participants in group 1 showed serial position effect

Participants in group 3 showed similar results and participants in group 3 showed the greatest difference as they remembered quite well the first pieces on the list but their recency effect was highly diminished. In all condisions the middle words were recalled the worst.

Conclusion: There must me two separate stores as

Primacy effect is the results of first words entering LTM due to time for rehearsal

Recency effect is the result of information of words still processed by STM that is why when the process was interfered by counting backwards the longer the interference the more diminished the recency effect as information was not rehearsed and in result lost - support limited duration and capacity if STM and presence of LTM

Evaluation of MSM :

• It does not explain how exactly STM enetr LTM

• does not explain how we are able to multitask

• is excellent basic explanation of complucated cognitive process that allows for ease analysis in researches

• Many research supports the model

Working memory model (Baddley and Hitch) - emphasizes active processing and manipulation of information during tasks.

Phonological loop - subdivides into the articulatory control system (inner voice) and the phonological store (inner ear), responsible for processing auditory information and verbal material.

Visuospatial sketchpad

• responsible for processing visual and spatial information.

Episodic buffer

• integrates information from the phonological loop, visuospatial sketchpad, and LTM for coherent understanding.

• is like a temporal storage that facilitates the integration of information from different memory systems to create a cohesive representation.

Central Executive (Boss)

• coordinates attention and resources across the different memory systems.

• switches and divides attention between tasks

• has limited capacity

They can work stimutaneosly like phonological loop and visuospatial sketchpad and episodic buffer

Study: Baddley and Hitch

Aim: to investigate whether STM is unitary system or composed of multiple components that are able to handle multiple tasks at once.

Procedure: researchers conducted Dual Processing experiment. Participants were asked to do 2 tasks at the same time. First was reasoning task (treu/false questions) Second task was either repeating a random list of digits (up to 6) or repeating random letters or no second task - control group. The repeating digits or letters was supposed to occupy phonological loop whereas reasoning tasks needed attention and processing - engaging Central executive.

Results showed that there was minimal interference between two tasks and participants were able to complte both tasks at once. The participants that multitask needed more time to answer reasoning question but the correctness of their responses did not differ significantly between groups.

Conclusion Study suggest that STM is not a unitary system but rather composed of multiple sub systems each responsible fro diiferent type of information. If a STM was a unitary system teh correctness of responses would suffer significantly when multistasking. The stody supporst Working memory model.

WWM is only alternative for STM it does not question sensory memory or long term memory

Schema theory

Schema theory explains how our past experiences, beliefs and prejudices affect our decisions and perception of a world. It involved concept od schema which is a mental framework that organizes and interprets information. It is biased and our schemas can lead to distortions in memory and recall as they help us make sense of the wolrd by process of assimilation and accommodation. Assimilation is when we fit new info into pre-existing schemas. It is the process when our perception of an aspect might became distorted as we often change that information in order to fit it. Accomodation is when we create new schema because new information doesn’t fit to exixsting schemas . Assimilation is far easier process and that is why we rely on it more often which affetcs our thinking and decison-making. Schemas shows how our memories can be distorted either by assimilation or later recall.

Schema theory explains how our past experiences, beliefs, and biases shape our understanding of the world through mental frameworks that organize and interpret information, potentially leading to distortions in memory.

Studies: Brewer and Treyens (1981)

Aim: to investigate how schemas affect our retrieval of information.

Procedure: Participants were placed in an office and believed to be waiting for a real study (deception was used). They were waiting for around 35 seconds. The office in which they were waiting had most of things that a schema of “office” would include but it aslo lacked some itemas like book and there were also some objects that did not fit into “office” schema like skull. After waiting researchers divided participants in 3 conditions:

• Recall condition: Write down a description of as many objects as they could remember from the office.

• Drawing condition: Draw the office and the items they remembered in their correct locations.

• Recognition condition: Given a list of objects and asked to select which ones had been in the office.

Results:

• Participants were more likely to recall schema-consistent items (e.g., staplers, books—even if books weren't present).

• They were less likely to remember schema-inconsistent items (e.g., skull or bark), or misremembered their presence.

• This suggests that schemas influence retrieval, often leading to false memories based on expectations.

The study supports the idea that schema help us understand the world around us . The study duggest that our memory is prone to ditrortion because of that as perticpants also recalled object that were not present in the office room but were schema consistent. This shows that participants recall was influenced by their pre-existing schema of an office.

Reconstructive memory

The theory that memory is not a perfect reproduction of past events, but instead involves the recreation of experiences influenced by beliefs, motivations, and prior knowledge. This process can lead to distortions or alterations in the recollection of events. Involves schema theory.

Loftus and Palmer (1974) and Neisser and Harsh(1992)

Loftus and Palmer (1974) investigated how the phrasing of questions can influence eyewitness testimony and memory recall.

Procedurez:

Lab experiment:

45 participants who watched videos of car accidents and were asked to: How fast was the cars going when they (smashed/ collided/ bumped/ hit/ contacted) each other?

The words were the conditions to which partcipants were randomly assigned. A follow up experiment included the question : “ Did you see any broken glass?” after about a week after seeing videos (there was no broken glass presnst in the videos)

Results: The verb used affected participants’ estimations of speed: “smashed “ prompted higher speed estimates than "contacted." Participants who heard "smashed" were more likely to report seeing broken glass than those in other groups. This demonstrates how language can shape memory recall. And provides insight into possible effect of leading questions in eye witness testimony recall

Conclusion:

Post event information (wording of a question) altered memory

memory is reconstructed not simply retrieved - is sensitive to suggestions and distortions

Limitation: Although high internal validity we do not know if participants drurijg a week break talked about the video or not maybe they watched some movies that presented similar situation all of that could affect later participant responses so possible confounding variables (not only wording a question affected glass recall)

Additionally the task was artifical there is low ecological validity (absence of emotions)

Neisser and Harsh (1992) investigated the flashbulb memory reliance

Aim : to test the reliability of flashbulb memories (emotionally charged vivid memories) over time .

Procedure: Above 100 collage students completed questionnaire the day after the Challenger space shuttle explosion. They desribed what were they doing when they were informed by the accident or who informed them, what were they doing and with who, where they alone. After 2.5 years later (smaller sample of the same students) were asked to recall the event again and rate how sure they are of their memories. their answers were compared to the original responses.

Results:

• only 25% of participants remembered the event consistently

• 40 % had major distortions, but most were confident in their accurance

• There were participants which respnses were not consitent at all with their previous responses

• when shown their resposnes from 2.5 years before they did not recognize them and stayed in a state of disbelief. Beliefs that their currect memories are true and accurate.

  Conclusion: even highly emotional vivid memories are not immune to distortions

• Supports reconstructive memory

Strengths:

real world - event high ecological validity longitudinal design

Limitation: self reported data

Flashbulb memories - emotions and cognition

Highly detailed and vivid memories of significant events, often involving emotional intensity.

Emotion is a physiological and psychological response to stimuli and can impact the formation and retrieval of these memories, making them seem more reliable despite their potential for distortion.

Studies: Neisser and Harsh and Sharot et al. (2007)

Aim: to investigate the role of biological factors (amygdala activity) in flashbulb memories formation related to 9/11 attacts

Procedure:

quasi experiment

• Conducted in New York City 3 years after the 9/11 attacts

• 24 participants that were either close or far from the incident were placed in fMRI scanner and were shown word cues either related to “Summer” events (control test) or “September” events - attact on World Trade Center.

• While recalling brain activity mainly amygdala was recorded

• Participants also gave self-reports on memory vividness and confidence

Results:

Participants closer to World Trade Center showed grater amygdala activation when recalling 9/11. Amygdala is a structure of a brain associated with emotion regulation (like stress) and stress response (flight or fight mechanism)

These participants also reported more vivid and emotionallly intense memories

Only half of participants reported flashbulb memories and those were generally people who were closer to Word Trade Center . - suggsting that flashbulb memories are formed when we are personally affected

Conclusion: Emotion via fear enhanced memory vividness - suggest biological basis for emotion’s effect on memory

Models of thinking and decison making and also cognitive bias

Dual processing model that describes two systems of thought: System 1 for quick, automatic responses and System 2 for slower, more deliberate reasoning.

Cognitive bias the tendency to rely on mental shortcuts that can lead to systematic deviations from rationality in judgment and decision-making.

Kahneman and Tversky (1974)

Aim: to investigate how people make decisions under time pressure and uncertainty. (and slo to investigate the effect of heuristic and cognitive bias on decison making (anchoring bias first info influence our decisons)

Divided into 2 groups:

Group 1: ascending condition math equation showed like this (1 × 2 × 3 × 4 × 5 × 6 × 7 × 8)

Group 2 : descending condition math problem showed like this (8 × 7 × 6 × 5 × 4 × 3 × 2 × 1)

They were given only 5 second to guess the answer. (both equations have the same answer 40 320)

Results:

• Participants in ascending condition gave lower estimates (with median around 500) than participants in descending condition (with median of 2 250)

• They show that participants relied on first piece of information (anchoring bias) and used system 1 thinking that relies on heuristics and may leads to errors. System 1 is intuitive and prone to bias