cog w5

• Atkinson and Shiffrin's Modal Model of Memory:

  • Sensory memory: initial stage holding incoming information for seconds
  • Short-term memory: holds 5-7 items for 15-20 seconds
  • Long-term memory: holds large amount of information for years
  • Rehearsal process helps move information from short-term to long-term memory

  
• Sensory memory retains effects of sensory stimulation briefly, with iconic memory for visual and echoic memory for auditory information

  
• Short-term memory stores small amounts of information briefly, including new information from sensory stores and recalled from long-term memory
• Duration of short-term memory: measured by recalling information after a delay, with decay explained by the vanishing of a memory trace due to time and exposure to stimuli
• Proactive interference occurs when old information interferes with new learning, while retroactive interference happens when new learning interferes with remembering old learning
• Baddeley's Working Memory Model:

  • Components: phonological loop, visuospatial sketchpad, and central executive
  • Phonological loop stores verbal and auditory info, visuospatial sketchpad stores visual and spatial info, central executive integrates info from both

  
• Chunking increases digit span by combining small units into larger meaningful units, as shown by George Miller's "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two"
• Control processes in memory are active processes that can be controlled by the person, such as rehearsal and attention strategies
• Sensory memory is the retention, for brief periods of time, of the effects of sensory stimulation, with iconic memory for visual stimuli and echoic memory for auditory stimuli
• Short-term memory (STM) stores small amounts of information for a brief duration (15-20 seconds) and includes both new information received from sensory stores and information recalled from long-term memory (LTM)
• Working memory (WM) is a limited-capacity system for temporary storage and manipulation of information for complex tasks like comprehension, learning, and reasoning
• The central executive in working memory is like a "traffic cop" or "attention controller" that pulls information from long-term memory and coordinates the activity of the phonological loop and visuospatial sketchpad
• Episodic buffer is a backup store in Baddeley's model of working memory that communicates with long-term and working memory components, holding information longer and having greater capacity than the phonological loop or visuospatial sketchpad