Sensory Memory (coding, capacity, duration)

• Sensory Memory is a brief storage of information in humans wherein information is momentarily registered until it is recognised and perhaps transferred to short-term memory.
• Sensory memory suggests that we gather information from the outside world via our senses and if we don't use this information consciously and immediately it will be lost through decay.
• Study 1:

  -Shown the whole grid for 250 milliseconds.

  -Asked to recall the whole grid.

  -On average they recalled 42% of the grid.

  This shows us that capacity is very large because we 'register' the digits, BUT they DECAY VERY RAPIDLY. This tells us that duration is very limited.
• Study 2:

  -Shown the whole grid for the same amount of time.

  -Asked to recall a specific row.

  -On average they recalled 75% of that row- didn't matter which row it was!

  The experiment indicated that the participants could recall the information as long as they were focused on the pertinent row before the memory of the letters vanished.
• IN A NUTSHELL.....

  -SM stores are large in capacity that hold information for only a couple of seconds.

  -All of our senses( sight, touch, hearing, taste and smell) have a separate store within SM.

  -Visual SM(iconic) and auditory SM(echoic) are the main components where research has been carried out.