Cognitive psychology

• Sperling (1960) SM


  Pps shown 3 rows of words for 0.05 seconds, average recall 4.3 words, but pps were aware of others. When asked to remember a specific row, they remembered better (payed attention)
• Miller (STM)


  Recall helped in STM by chunking as it reduces the number therefore less capacity taken up.
• KF- case study


  LTM after accident normal but STM severely impaired suggesting memory is not linear.
• Brain scanning- Squire


  Hippocampus more active in LTM but pre-frontal cortex more active during STM tasks.
• Primacy and recency effect


  remember words at start of list and end of list
• Reitman


  STM longer than 15-30 seconds. Pps given 5 words for 2 secs and listened to a faint voice over headphones (required attention so prevented rehearsal) recall of words declined by 24% suggesting STM longer than previously thought.
• Corkin- HM


  Star drawn in mirror, didn't remember doing it but got better each time. Different types of LTM.
• DeGroot


  Expert chess players better than amateurs at remembering places of pieces on a board because used LTM to inform STM. Shows memory isn't linear.
• Morris


  Football fans better at remembering the list of scores of teams because they used LTM to aid STM.
• Flashbulb memories


  a clear memory of an emotionally significant moment or event.
• Baddeley and Hitch dual tasks


  STM is not one unitary system but consists of different components. Two tasks are able to be carried out simultaneously providing that they use different parts of working memory.
• Darling


  Pps performed worse on spatial task when there was spatial interference but it didn't affect their performance with visual interference supporting separation of visual-spatial scratch pad elements.
• KF


  1-2 digit span, impaired phonological loop as couldn't remember words but could remember meaningful sounds like ringing.
• Williams syndrome


  Difficulty comprehending words with spatial prepositions suggesting associations between visual spatial scratch pad and phonological loop.
• Lieberman


  Blind people have very good spatial awareness despite having no visual input, so the WMM is inaccurate in this regard.
• Word length effect


  Longer words take longer to rehearse than short words so harder to remember. Supported by phonological loop.
• Spiers


  Priming effect- amnesiacs unconscious, automatic responses provoked by priming words e.g. "yellow" can be used to provoke the word "banana" when asked to name a fruit.
• Hodges and Peterson


  Alzheimer's good recent EM, poor SM- supports idea of separate memory stores in LTM.
• Bartlett War of the Ghosts


  White pps asked to remember a Native American tale and pps inaccurately recalled ROADS to relate to their schemas.
• Brewer and Treyens


  Remember things inconsistent with schemas e.g. The skull in the office.
• Steyvers and Hemmer


  Argue the experimental conditions of such research deliberately induce errors in recall leading to the view that memory is unreliable. This demonstrates in real context, without manipulated material, schematic recall can be very accurate.
• List (1986)


  High probability events about shoplifting scenario likely to be recalled supporting that we use schemas to inform our recall.
• Allport and Postman


  Showed pps mugging scenario of white man robbing black man, when pps asked to recall later they reversed the scenario.