Working memory model

• who proposed the working memory model?

  Baddeley and Hitch
• What is the working memory model?

  Explains how short term memory is organised and functions

  - STM must be more complex than just a single unitary store.

  -STM must be an active processor, holding multiple different types of information simultaneously while being worked on
• What are the parts of the Working memory model?

  central executive , Phonological loop , Visuo-Spatial Sketchpad , Episodic buffer
• What is the Central executive?


  Monitors incoming data and coordinates the activities of the 3 slave subsystems in memory.

  - Directs attention to a specific slave system

  - Has very limited processing capacity so is unable to store data
• What is the phonological loop?

  Deals with auditory information and preserves the order in which information arrives.

  - It has two subdivisions: The phonological store which stores the words you hear and the Articulatory processes which allows maintenance rehearsal
• What is the visuo-spatial sketchpad?

  Stores visual and spatial information and has limited capacity.

  - Has two subdivisions: The visual cache which stores visual data and the inner scribe which record the arrangement of objects in the visual field
• What is the episodic buffer?

  A temporary store for information that integrates visual , spatial and verbal information processed by the other stores into a single memory and maintains a sense of time sequencing.

  - It also links working memory to LTM and wider cognitive processes such as perception
• Evaluation- Strength: Braver

  Braver gave participants some reasoning tasks while they were undergoing a PET scan. The results of this scan highlighted that the prefrontal cortex was experiencing the highest amount of activity and being used the most. Therefore, this supports the theory that the central executive does exist, both in the model and physically in the brain, and that it is used for reasoning tasks. This supports psychology as a science due to its scientific nature.
• Evaluation- Strength: Shallice and Warrington

  Shallice and Warrington carried out a case study on patient KF who had brain damage.The patient had poor

  STM ability and struggled to process auditory material presented verbally but could process visual information presented visually.This suggests that his phonological loop had been damaged leaving the other areas of memory intact thus supporting the existence of a separate visual and acoustic store which are present in the WMM called the phonological loop and the visuo-spatail sketchpad
• Evaluation- Limitation: The central executive has not been precisely defined.

  The term 'process' is vague, and the central executive may be made up of several sub-components or even be part of a larger component itself in working memory. This lack of a comprehensive explanation for each component of WMM draws doubts about the accuracy of its depiction of working memory.
• Evaluation- Strength: Dual task performance .