working memory model

• Central executive

  Baddeley and Hitch - STM 4 main components - CE supervisory component - directs attention to incoming information - can code information from any modality (non-specific) - has very limited storage but can delegate information to slave systems - can carry out more than one task at a time using different slave systems
• Phonological loop

  codes and acts as a temporary storage for holding acoustic information and deals with written and spoken material - preserves order the information arrives in - limited capacity and subdivided into phonological store (inner ear - rehearses sounds you hear - words) and articulatory process (inner voice - holds and silently repeats words we are preparing to speak - maintenance rehearsal)
• visuo-spatial sketchpad

  inner eye - codes visual information (what objects look like in terms of form and colour) and spatial information (physical relationship between objects) - limited capacity
• episodic buffer

  added in 2000 - integrates information from CE, PL and VSS and links working memory to LTM - limited capacity - can code information from any modality - can maintain a sense of time sequencing which allows to record events happening as a single memory not separate strands
• EVALUATION - STM not unitary

  shows STM has separate stores - KF - verbal STM damaged for verbal STM (could only manage 2 digits on digit span test) - visual STM remained intact - STM has separate stores otherwise damage to KF's STM would have been equal
• EVALUATION -dual task research

  WMM can explain why participants struggle to process 2 similar tasks at once but can process 2 different tasks at once in STM because different tasks use different slave systems - Baddeley found participants had more difficulty doing 2 visual tasks (tracking a light and describing the letter F) than doing one visual and one verbal task at the same time - suggests different slave systems for visual and verbal tasks
• EVALUATION - real life applications

  being able to identify different aspects of STM allows psychologists to target certain kinds of memory - e.g. educational psychologists developed memory training to specifically improve verbal memory to improve learning for students experiencing difficulties - can improve people's lives
• EVALUATION - fails to accountfor musical memory

  means WMM can't explain why people are able to process music differently to other sounds - Berz demonstrated participants could listen to instrumental music without impairing performance on other acoustic tasks - suggests may be more than one acoustic store