Memory P1

define memory

the way in which information is organised, stored and recalled

define encoding

and define acoustic, semantic and visual encoding

• the way in which information is changed into a format which our brain can use.

• acoustic / phonological - based on how it sounds.

• semantic - based on what it means

• visual / orthographic - based on how it looks

define storage, memory duration and memory capacity

• the way in which information is kept in our memory much can be stored

• memory duration - how long it can be stored for

• memory capacity - how much can be stored

define retrieval, recall and recognition

• the way in which information is brought from our memory to our conscious awareness to be used.

• recall - bringing information to the conscious mind

• recognition - identifying whether information has been encountered before

describe the multistore model

• SENSORY REGISTER

• we process everything we sense (i.e the 5 senses) around us in the sensory register

• information is processed in the way it is recieved

• the information lasts for 0.25 seconds.

• very large capacity

• encoding : modality specific

SHORT TERM MEMORY

• if we pay attention to the information it goes to our short term memory

• encoding - acoustic

• capacity = 5-9 things (7+-2 things)

• duration = 18-30 seconds

• we can rehearse information to keep it in our short term memory

LONG TERM MEMORY

• if you rehearse the information long enough it goes to our long term memory

• could either be maintenance rehearsal or elaborative rehearsal

• to get the information out of the long term memory we do retrieval.

• encoding : semantic

• capacity - unlimited

• duration - unlimited

what are the labels on a serial position curve

primacy effect

displacement

recency effect

explain primacy effect, displacement and recency effect

primacy effect = high recall for items at the beginning of the list due to rehearsal meaning the information can go to the long term memory

displacement = less recall for words in the middle of the list because they get displaced as there is not enough time to rehearse the information for it to go to the long term memory and also because the short term memory has a capacity of 9 things so cannot cover the information

recency effect = better recall for items at the end of the list because they are still in the short term memory

strength of multistore model (duration of sensory register )

P - Sperling's (1960) study provides evidence that the sensory register has duration of approximately 0.25 seconds.

E - When asked to recall a full 12-letter grid, participants could only remember 4 or 5 letters before the memory faded.

However, when a tone immediately directed them to recall just one row (taking less than 0.25 seconds to speak), recall was over 75%. Delaying this tone by just 0.25 seconds caused recall accuracy to drop drastically.

Explanation - Trying to recall all 12 letters takes longer than 0.25 seconds, causing the sensory trace to disappear before participants can finish speaking. The immediate single-row recall proves that all information is briefly held, but decays after 0.25 seconds if not immediately transferred to short-term memory.

strength of multistoremodel (capcity of stm)

P - Jacobs' (1887) digit span test provides evidence supporting the capacity of short-term memory (STM).

Evidence - Jacobs tested 443 female students (aged 8 to 19) who had to read back a string of numbers of increasing length until they got one wrong, finding an average span of 7.3 letters and 9.3 words.

Explanation: This data supports the idea that the maximum capacity of STM is limited commonly known as 7 ± 2 items or things.

strength of multistoremodel (capacity of stm)

Point: Miller's (1956) review provides supporting evidence for the capacity of short-term memory.

Evidence: Miller observed that people can hold about seven items in short-term memory (plus or minus two) by storing information in "chunks" rather than individual numbers or letters.

Explanation: This suggests that the capacity of short-term memory is limited to 7±2 items, which can be expanded by grouping information into larger chunks, such as remembering phone numbers.

strength multistore model (encoding of stm and ltm)

P - Baddeley's (1966) study provides clear evidence for how information is encoded differently in short-term memory (STM) and long-term memory (LTM).

E - When asked to recall words immediately, participants struggled most with acoustically similar words, whereas when recalling after 20 minutes, they struggled most with semantically similar words.

E - This occurs because STM relies on acoustic coding; when words sound the same, STM perceives them as identical, causing confusion and poorer recall. Conversely, - LTM relies on semantic coding; when words share similar meanings, LTM struggles to distinguish them as separate concepts, leading to lower accuracy.

• Overall, this demonstrates that STM encodes acoustically, while LTM encodes semantically.

strength of multistore model (duration of stm)

Point: Peterson and Peterson's (1959) study provides evidence supporting the limited duration of short-term memory (STM).

Evidence: Participants were given a nonsense trigram and a three-digit number, then counted backwards in multiples of three to prevent rehearsal over varying time intervals (such as 3, 6, 9, or up to 18 seconds) before recalling the trigram. Results showed that while recall was near 80% after 3 seconds, it dropped drastically as the time interval increased, reaching less than 10% after 18 seconds.

Explanation: The sharp decline in correct recall over longer time intervals demonstrates that without verbal rehearsal, information in short-term memory rapidly decays, confirming that the duration of STM is limited to roughly 18 to 30 seconds.

strength of multistore model (duration of ltm)

Point: One strength of msm is that there is supporting evidence to show the duration of long-term memory (LTM) is potentially lifelong.

Evidence: Bahrick et al. (1975) tested participants aged 17–74 using high school yearbooks. They found that photo recognition was 90% accurate for those who graduated within 15 years, and remained high at 70% for participants who had left school decades earlier.

Explanation: This supports the view that LTM has an extremely long duration, as recall and recognition accuracy remain remarkably high even after so many years.

strength of msm (capacity of ltm)

Point: One strength of research msm is that there is supporting evidence to suggest the capacity of long-term memory (LTM) is potentially limitless.

Evidence: Wagenaar (1986) recorded over 2400 events in a diary over six years, noting who, when, what, and where. When tested using these cues, he had 75% recall of a critical detail after 1 year and 45% after 5 years, maintaining an 80% sense of remembering the event after 5 years.

Explanation: This supports the view that LTM has a vast capacity, because even after storing thousands of individual memories, specific events can still be recalled in detail rather than being overwritten or pushed out by new information.

strength of msm ( evidence that stm and ltm are different)

Point: One strength of the Multi-Store Model (MSM) is that there is supporting evidence to suggest that short-term memory (STM) and long-term memory (LTM) are separate, distinct memory stores.

Evidence: Milner (1966) studied patient HM, who had parts of his temporal lobe removed to treat severe epilepsy. Following the operation, HM’s short-term memory functioned normally, but his long-term memory was severely impaired, leaving him unable to form new long-term memories.

Explanation: This supports the MSM because it shows that damage to specific brain structures can selectively impair LTM while leaving STM intact, proving that STM and LTM operate as independent memory stores.

weakness of msm (different types of stm)

Point: One limitation of the Multi-Store Model is that there is contradictory evidence

suggesting there are different types of short-term memory, which the model fails to consider.

Evidence: Shallice and Warrington (1970) studied patient KF, who developed amnesia after a

motorcycle accident. They found that KF's short-term memory for verbal information was very

poor (e.g., when digits were read aloud to him), but his recall for visual information remained

unaffected (e.g., when he read the digits himself).

Explanation: This contradicts the MSM's view that STM is a single, unitary store, showing

instead that STM consists of separate stores for processing auditory and visual information.

weakness of msm (doesnt consider elaborative rehearsal)

Point: A further limitation of the Multi-Store Model is that there is contradictory evidence

regarding rehearsal, suggesting there are different types of rehearsal that the MSM does not

consider.

Evidence: Craik and Watkins (1973) argued that there are two distinct types of rehearsal:

maintenance rehearsal (which simply holds information in STM) and elaborative rehearsal

which links information to existing knowledge). They found that elaborative rehearsal, rather

han simple repetition, is required for long-term storage.

Explanation: This weakens the MSM because it oversimplifies memory transfer by focusing

purely on the amount of maintenance rehearsal, rather than the type or depth of processing

meeded to transfer information into LTM.

what are the parts of the working memory model

• focuses on how stm is organised and functions

• 
  

• Central Executive

• phonological loop

• episodic buffer

• visuospatial sketchpad

explain the central executive of the working memory model

• 'Supervisory' role

• controls the Working Memory Model

• Monitors incoming information and directs attention to and controls the 'slave systems'

• Very limited capacity - does not store information

• Deals with reasoning and decision-making tasks

• coding - modality free

explain the Phonological Loор of working memory model

• Slave system responsible for processing auditory information (coding = acoustic)

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Two sub-systems:

• Articulatory control system (inner-voice) - allows you to use your inner-voice to repeat information in your mind (maintenance rehearsal)

• capacity believed to be two seconds' worth of what you can say

• Phonological store (inner-ear) - stores acoustic information (speech- based sound) for a short period of time

explain the Visuospatial Sketchpad of working memory model

• Slave system responsible for processing visual and spatial information

• coding - visual and spatial information

• Limited capacity of about 3-4 pieces of information

Two sub-systems:

• Inner-scribe - deals with the spatial relationship between objects i.e -it records the arrangement and layout of objects in your visual field

• Visual cache - stores visual information (e.g. colours, shapes, textures etc)

explain the episodic buffer of working memory model

• Added to the model at a later date (2000) when Baddeley and Hitch realised that there was no general storage facility

• Binds and integrates information from all of the other components and maintains a sense of time sequencing (recording events/episodes)

• Storage component for central executive

• Limited capacity of about 4 chunks

• coding - modality free

strength of wmm

• Point (P): One strength is that Baddeley's dual-task experiment acts as supporting evidence.

• Evidence (E): Participants took part in different tasks. When the task was dual (visual and verbal), their performance was similar to when the tasks were carried out separately, but when both tasks were visual or both were verbal, performance declined.

• Explanation (E): This supports the Working Memory Model (WMM) as it shows doing two tasks using the same store is more difficult. This proves the two stores act independently from each other and give-and-take from each other, and each store has a limited capacity.

• Critique (C): However, this evidence using dual tasks is an artificial task which doesn't represent actual real-life activities that happen every day, so we don't know if people in real life would find it difficult doing tasks that require the same store. Therefore, it lacks mundane realism.

strenght of wmm

• Point (P): Patient KF acts as a supporting piece of evidence.

• Evidence (E): Patient KF—motorcycle accident—following the accident couldn't recall verbal acoustic information, but could recall visual information.

• Explanation (E): This supports the WMM because it suggests that there are multiple different stores of short-term memory (STM). It shows that the visuo-spatial sketchpad works, but the phonological loop doesn't work.

• Critique (C): However, it is a case study of only one person, so the findings cannot be generalised to the wider population, as we don't know if other people in the same scenario wouldn't be able to process verbal information but process visual information.

weakness of wmm -

• Point (P): One weakness is that the methodology lacks mundane realism, such as recalling unusual tasks of numbers and sequences, and often carried out in highly controlled environments.

• Evidence/Explanation (E): This is a weakness because these tasks are artificial, so they don't represent everyday real-life activities. We don't know if in real life the WMM works in the same way.