The working memory model

• The working memory model

  Is an explanation of how one aspect of memory (short term) is organised and how it functions.

  The WMM is concerned with ‘mental space’ that is active when we are temporarily storing and manipulating information like when we play chess.

  The model consists of 4 components qualitatively different with coding and capacity.
• Central executive

  Has a ‘supervisory’ role. It monitors incoming data focusing and dividing our limited attention and allocates subsystems to tasks. The CE has a very limited processing capacity and does not store information.
• Phonological loop

  A subsystem dealing with auditory information like acoustic coding and preserves the order in which the information arrives,

  Phonological store which stores words you hear

  The articulatory process allows maintenance rehearsal in a loop, the capacity is believed to be two second worth of what you can say
• Visuo-spatial sketchpad

  The second subsystem is visuo-spatial sketchpad. The VSS stores visual and or spatial information when required. For example, if you are asked to work out how many windows there are on your house you visualise it.

  Has a limited capacity which according to Baddeley in 2003 is about three or four objects. Robert Logie in 1995 subdivided the VSS into

   the visual cache, which stores visual data

   inner scribe that records the arrangement of objects in the visual field
• Episodic buffer

  The third subsystem is the episodic buffer added to the model by baddeley in 2000. It is a temporary store for information integrating the visual, spatial and verbal information processed by other stores maintaining time sequencing, recording events that are happening.

  It can be seen as storage component of the central executive and has a limited capacity of about 4 chunks by baddeley in 2012. The episodic buffer links working memory to long term memory and wider cognitive processes such as perception.
• Who conducted the 1970 case study of patient KF?

  Tim Shallice and Elizabeth Warrington
• What type of memory did patient KF have poor ability in?

  Short-term memory for auditory information
• How did KF's immediate recall of letters and digits differ based on presentation method?

  Better when read visually than acoustically
• What part of KF's memory was damaged?

  Phonological loop
• What part of KF's memory remained intact?

  Visuospatial sketchpad
• What does KF's case study support regarding memory stores?

  Existence of separate visual and acoustic memory stores
• What is a counterpoint to the findings from KF's case study?

  Unclear if other cognitive impairments existed
• How might KF's motorcycle accident have influenced his memory performance?

  Trauma may have affected cognitive performance
• What challenge does KF's case study present to clinical evidence?

  Brain injuries may affect multiple cognitive systems
• What does dual-task performance study support?

  The separate existence of the visuo-spatial sketchpad
• What did Baddeley's 1975 study involve?

  Participants performing visual and verbal tasks simultaneously
• What was the outcome when participants performed dual tasks compared to separate tasks?

  Performance was similar in both conditions
• What happened to performance when both tasks were visual or verbal?

  Performance on both tasks declined substantially
• Why did performance decline when both tasks were visual or verbal?

  Both tasks compete for the same subsystem
• What does the study suggest about processing visual and verbal tasks together?

  There is no competition when tasks are mixed
• What conclusion can be drawn about the visuo-spatial sketchpad from the study?

  It processes visual input separately from verbal tasks
• Nature of the central executive

  Limitation

  A limitation is that there is a lack of clarity over the nature of central executive

  Baddeley in 2003 himself recognised this when he said ‘the central executive is the most important but the least understood component of working memory’

  The CE needs to be more clearly specificed than just being simply ‘attention’. For example some psychologists believe that CE may consist of separate subcomponents.

  Means CE is an unsatisfactory component and this challenges integrity of the WMM.
• Validity of the model- limitation evaluation extra

  We have seen that dual task studies support the WMM because two tasks that share a subsystem are much harder to perform together than tasks that involve separate subsystems. Therefore, there must be separate components in working memory.

  These studies use tasks that are very unlike the tasks we perform in our everyday lives like recalling random sequences of letters. They are also carried out in highly controlled lab conditions where presentation of stimuli is precisely timed.