memory

the multi store model

created in 1968 by the Petersons, idea that we have 2 memory stores: long term and short term

short term memory (STM)

limited capacity to 5-9 units of information, duration is around 18 seconds, coding is mainly acoustic

long-term memory (LTM)

permanent memory store, only limited by death, coding is mainly semantic

coding

the format information is stored

acoustically= sounds

semantically= meaning

Peterson and Petersons research

the trigram theory - we can remember more information if its chunked into 3 words/letters/numbers as it makes then one singular unit

they found that the STM can hold information for around 18 seconds

Baddelys research in 1966

he presented participant with a list of 10 words and asked them to recall once from their STM and once from their LTM

he found that we make more acoustic errors in STM (fountain/mountain) and in LTM we make more semantic errors (hill/mountain)

Millers research in 1956

researched capacity of STM and the idea of chunking

he discovered we can hold 5-9 units of information in the STM at one time

Barricks research in 1975

he tested uni grads on putting names to yearbook photos

after 15 years of graduation there was 90% accuracy and after 48 years it dropped to 70%

3 types of long term memory

• Episodic (events in your life)

• Semantic (meaning of words/facts)

• Procedural (skills/how we do things)

The working memory model

Proposed by Baddley in 1975

WMM central executive

An attentional process that assigns a slave system to each task, limited storage capacity

WMM phonological loop

Preserves auditory infomation, consists of phonological store and articulatory process

WMM Viso-spatial sketchpad

Stores visual and spatial information, consists of visual cache and an inner scribe

Episodic buffer

Tempera storage of both types of information and transfers it to LTM

Strengths of the WMM

Patient KF had brain damage - his phonological loop was damaged but other aspects of his memory was fine

Baddley found participants performed higher when doing two tasks at a time if one was visual and one was verbal rather than two of the same kind

Limitations of WMM

The central executive doesn’t have enough research done on it and it could be too simple

We can’t scientifically prove/disapprove the model

two explanations for forgetiing

interference

retrival failure

Pro active interference

Old information interfering with new information

retro active interference

New information interferes with old information

What makes interference worse?

Similarity in the information, research by McGough and McDonald gave participants two lists of words to memorise and then asked them to recall the 1st list, if the two lists were synonyms inference was much higher compared to numbers

retrival failure

the idea that all of our memories are stored in our brains but we are often unable to retrive them due to a lack of cues

external cues

context-dependant e.g. place or weather

internal cues

state-dependant e.g emotion or being drunk

encoding specifity principle

a cue must be both present when the memory is first coded and when it is retrieved (Tulving)

retrieval failure theory evaluation and real world application

Baddeley concluded that cues are important but don’t fully explain how or why we forget, it should be used alongside interference theory for the best understanding

students would get better scores in tests if they were sat in the classroom that the lessons were taught in