research evidence the phonological loop and its limited capacity (findings and conclusion)
Findings:
Participants could remember more words from the short word list compared to the long word list
Conclusion:
the findings suggest that the phonological loop has a limited capacity and it depends on how much can be said in approx 2 seconds- longer words take longer to say so will have less recalled
to investigate how the performance of the initial task is affected depending on the second task given
- baddeley and hitch suggested that the MSM's unitary idea of the STM would not allow for any multitasking which means that it must be incorrect because people can multitask
1) WM had more detail about STM than the MSM. It says that the STM is not a unitary store, had multiple components actively working together to process info
2) Research evidence to support WM comes from dual task performance studies. These show that two tasks can be performed at the same time as long as they use different components
- baddeleys study supports this
3) Can be supported by case studies of amnesia patients eg KF
- KF had a damaged STM verbally but visually was fine
- with the knowledge of the WM, we can assume that it was his phonological loop was damaged but his visuospatial sketchpad was was in tact
- we dont really understand how it works and there may be more than one component
- Eslinger and Damasio studied EVR who had a brain tumor removed, he performed well on tests with reasoning which suggests his CE was intact but he had poor decision making skills which suggests his CE was not 100% intact
lab experiments such as baddeleys dual task studies often lack ecological validity because they involve unfamilliar stimulus material
the model fails to account for musical memory
- we are able to listen to instrumental music without imparing performance on other acoustic tasks
- this suggests the working memory does not offer a complete understanding of how memory works
pauseu demonstrated diff areas of the brain were activated when doing tasks which required the phonological store and the articulatory rehearsal system
- using a PET scan they found that brocas area was activated when a task needed to remember words and the supramarginal gyrus was activated when the phonological store was being used