Memory

• CODING, CAPACITY AND DURATION:


  What is the research on CODING?

  Baddely gave 4 groups of ptps different word lists to remember: acoustically similar, acoustically dissimilar, semantically similar, semantically dissimilar

  Ptpts were then asked to recall the words in order, those who recorded immediately after hearing did worse on acoustically similar words

  If ptpts were asked to recall words after a 20 minute time interval, they did worse with semantically similar words, suggesting that memory in LTM is encoded semantically
• What did Jacobs find in his


  research into capacity?Researched how much STM can hold using digit span

  He asked ptpts to recall digits in order til they no longer couldn't

  He found the mean span for numbers was 9.3 and the mean span for letters was 7.3
• (Research into capacity)


  What did Miller find about the span of memory and chunking?He observed daily practices and found things come in 7s, (7 days, 7 deadly sins etc). Then theorised the span of STM is

  7 +/- 2

  Also found that people can recall 5 words as well as they recall 5 letters as they 'chunk' them
• (Research on duration)


  What did Peterson and Peterson find out about the duration of STM?Each student was given a trigram and a set of numbers to recall (until told to stop) to prevent mental rehearsal of the trigram

  In each trial they were asked to stop at different intervals: known as the retention interval

  Memory starts rapidly declining after 9 seconds

  suggesting the duration of STM is very short unless the data is "verbally rehearsed"
• What did Bahrick find out about the duration of long term memory ?

  Studied 392 ptpts between the ages of 17 and 74

  Their yearbooks were obtained and they were asked to recall in many different ways

  1) Photo-recognition test contained 50 photos, some from the ptpts yearbook

  2) Free-recall were ptpts recalled all the names of their graduating class

  
  

  Photo-recognition was 90% accurate after 15 years

  After 48 years it declined to 70%

  
  

  Free Recall was 60% accurate after 15 years

  After 48 years it was 38%

  
  

  Suggesting LTM has a long duration
• What is an evaluation of Baddely's study:


  Limitation: Artificial task- used artificial materials, word lists had no meaning to the participants. This means it lacks mundane realism and we are unable to generalise this task to other memory studies and real life. So people may code semantically in STM when there's meaning attached. Findings are limited.
• What is an evaluation for Jacob's study?


  Limitation: Lacking validity- Lacks temporal validity (1887). Variables lacked control then and ptpts may have been distracted when carrying out the task. Confounding variables present.COUNTERARGUMENT: yet the results have been found in other studies
• What is an evaluation for Miller's study?


  Limitation: Miller may have overestimated the capacity of STM. Cowan reviewed other research and found that the capacity of STM is only 4 chunks. Suggesting Miller's lower end of the estimate is more accurate than 7.
• MULTI-STORE MODEL OF MEMORY:


  Who made the model and why?Atkinson and Shiffrin

  To describe how information flows through the memory systems

  Memory is made up by three stores and is linked by processing
• Describe the role of thesensory registor Stimulus from the environment is detected by our senses and passed through to the sensory register. Sensory Register has multiple stores within (one for each sense).Iconic memory store- Visual information is encoded visually.Echoic memory- auditory memory is encoded acoustically. Duration of sensory registers is half a second. Have a high capacity. Memory only passes onto the memory stores if you pay attention to the stimulus
• Describe the role


  short-term memory. Limited capacity store. Contains 5-9 pieces of information. Information is encoded acoustically. Lasts 30 seconds- unless it is rehearsed.Maintenance rehearsalis when we repeat things to ourselves over and over again. If we rehearse it long enough it can pass onto long-term memory
• Describe the role of


  long-term memory. Potentially permanent memory store when things have been rehearsed for a long period of time. Unlimited capacity. Incredibly long duration -Bahrick's study. Information is encoded semantically. When we recall information from LTM, it is passed onto STM in a process calledretrieval. According to MSM, no memory is directly recalled from LTM
• What are the strengths?


  Supporting research evidence-Research shows STM and LTM are different. Baddeley found we mix up words that sound similar when using our STM, but we mix up words that have similar meanings when we use our LTM. This shows that encoding is acoustic in STM and semantic in LTM. Supports the idea that these memory stores are separate and independent. Further support from the coding, capacity and duration studies.
• What are the weaknesses?

  More than one type of STM-MSM suggsts LTM is unitary store, but this may not be true for amnesia patients, as found by Shallice and Warrington. Case study of KF found that when digits were read aloud to him, his recall was very poor, in comparison to when he read the digits himself. Other studies surrounding KF found that there may be a STM store for non-verbal sounds. Suggesting this model is reductionist, and the additional stores are included in theWorking modelof memory.

  More than one type of rehearsal-MSM theorises that the amount of rehearsal you do is the only thing that matters, but Craik and Watkins found that it's the type of rehearsal you do that matters. Maintenance rehearsal keeps the memory in STM, but you needelaborative rehearsalto transfer it into LTM. This occurs when you link the information to preexisting knowledge, or think about what it means. Limitation because it means the model can't explain some research.
• TYPES OF LTM:


  What did Tulving split LTM up into?. Episodic

  . Procedural

  . Semantic
• What is episodic memory?


  . Ability to recall events. These memories aretime stampedso you remember when they occur. Memory contains many elements like people and places. Have to make conscious effort to recall memory
• What is semantic memory?


  . Knowledge and general facts about the world

  . Knowledge/understanding of concepts and words

  . Less personal and not time-stamped

  . Constantly being added to
• What is procedural memory?


  . How we do things (actions/skills)

  . Recall these memories without conscious effort

  . Difficult to explain how your carrying out tasks (like driving a car)
• What are the strengths?

  Clinical evidence-Case studies of HM and Clive Wearing were their episodic memory was impaired due to amnesia, yet both their semantic and procedural memory was still intact. Supports Tulving's idea of there being separate memory stores. Also evidence to show that the memories are stored in different areas of the brain.

  Neuroimaging evidence-In Tulving's gold study he found semantic and episodic memories were stored in different parts of the brain. Tulving assessed the blood flow of patients blood when carrying out memory tasks and found that there was a large amount of blood flow to the left prefrontal cortex when recalling semantic memories; and higher blood flow to the right prefrontal cortex when recalling episodic memories. Supporting the notion that these are separate memory stores that are even stored in different parts of the brain. Also supporting localisation and suggesting validity.

  RWA-Different stores of LTM allow psychologists to tackle specific aspects of memory to better people's lives. Belleville trained older people with a cognitive impairment how to better improve their episodic memory. Experimental group scored higher on an episodic memory test after being trained, in comparison to a control group. Episodic memory is affected the most by cognitive impairment, so by identifying memory stores, specific treatments can be made.
• WORKING MEMORY MODEL:


  What is the WMM?. Model devised by Baddeley to show information is stored in STM and how it functions

  . Consists of 4 components which have different capacities
• What is the Central Executive?


  . Attentional processor

  . Organises tasks to the slave systems

  . Very limited capacity
• What is the Phonological Loop?


  . Processes auditory information

  . Preserves order of information that arrives

  . Contains phonological store which stores words you hear

  . Contains articulatory process which allows for maintenance rehearsal

  . Capacity is 2 seconds worth of words
• What is the Visual Spatial Sketchpad?


  . Contains visual cache which processes and stores visual data

  . Contains inner scribe which stores information on the spatial awareness of objects in the visual field

  . Limited capacity- 3/4 objects (Baddeley and Logie)
• What is the Episodic Buffer?


  . Recently added by Baddeley

  . Temporary storage unit for the CE

  . Contains info from all stores

  . Limited capacity of 4 chunks

  . Connects to LTM and wider cognitive processes like perception
• What are the strengths?


  Dual task performance- Baddeley found that people can't carry out 2 visual tasks, but can carry out a verbal and a visual task. This is because the CE cant allocate tasks as they're both competing for the same slave system (VSSP). The competition creates conflict and explains why we can't multitask. It also shows support of their being 2 separate slave systems for visual and verbal processing.

  
  

  Proof of Phonological loop- Case study of brain damage patient KF (Shallice and Warrington) found that he could process visual information, but not verbal. He could remember digits and letters, but couldn't recall sounds. Showing how his phonological loop had been damaged but his VSSP was intact. Supports separate visual stores, but because KF is an idiographic study and it is extreme, we are unable to generalise findings to everyone, and results may be unreliable.

  
  

  Support for Word length effect- Baddeley found that people struggle to remember longer words because the articulatory process has a limited capacity of 2 seconds which makes maintenance rehearsal harder. But he found that by giving an articulatory suppressor task (like saying lalala) maintenance rehearsal could be improved. This is a strength because it provides RWA on how memory could be improved, and suggests ecological validity.
• What's a weakness?


  Lack of clarity over the CE- Psychologists suggest it's too simplistic to suggest that CE is just an attentional process, Baddeley also acknowledged this and said the CE is "the most important but the least understood". Psychologists suggest that the CE consists of more components. Suggesting the explanation of the WMM is not fully explained.
• Explanations for forgetting- INTERFERENCE: What is meant by interference?


  . When 2 pieces of information conflict with one another (because they're similar) which results in one being forgotten, or the memory becoming distorted

  . Occurs in LTM

  . The memory is already stored there, so it's more or less permanent, but we have trouble accessing it

  . Interference makes accessing the memory harder, later leads to forgetting

  . Occurs between memories that have been stored at different times
• What is proactive interference?


  . Older memory interferes with the new one

  . EXAMPLE: your old memory stops you from remembering your new one
• What is an example of retroactive interference?


  . New memory interferes with the old one

  . EXAMPLE: memorising your new phone number makes it harder for you to recall the old one
• What was the study of similarity from McGeoch and McDonald?


  . Studied retroactive interference by changing the similarity between 2 sets of word lists

  . Ptpts had to learn a list of 10 words until they learned them with 100% accuracy, they then learned another list

  . 6 groups learned different types of word lists (synonyms, antonyms, unrelated words, 3 digit numbers)

  . When ptpts recalled the original list, their recall depended on the nature of the second list

  . Synonyms produced the worst recall (because they were similar)
• What are the strengths of the explanation for interference?

  Evidence from lab studies- Interference is the most consistently demonstrated finding. All research shows that both types of interference affect LTM. Lab studies also have control over extraneous variables which improves validity of the explanation.

  
  

  Real-life studies- Baddeley and Hitch studied whether interference was more impactful on memory than the passage of time. They studied rugby players and asked them to recall the names of the teams they played last. They found that recall didnt depend on how long ago the played against the teams, but the names of the teams they played in between. Players recall was better 3 weeks ago, if they didnt play any games in between. Shows that interference affects everyday situations.
• What are the weaknesses?

  Artificial Material- Interference may be more likely in a lab study because of the artificial task used. Memorising word lists lacks mundane realism because it tells us little about how we use memory in real life. They're better than trigrams but still suggest that interference is more of an explanation in lab settings. Suggesting the explanation lacks ecological validity.

  
  

  Time between learning- Ptpts are forced to learn word lists within minutes of each other, in real life we often dont have to learn tasks like this. So tasks lack mundane realism in this way.
• RETRIEVAL FAILURE THEORY: What is a reason for why some people may forget?


  - Insufficient cues

  - Cues that were present at the time of encoding may be absent at the time of retrieval, which explains forgetting, because you cant access the memory
• Outline and explain Encoding specificity principle (ESP)

  . Tulving

  . If you want a cue to trigger a memory, it has to be present during encoding

  . If cues are absent or different at retrieval, forgetting occurs

  . Some cues are linked to memories in a meaningful way, like mneumonics

  . Other cues are encoded, but arent meaningful, like context dependent forgetting and state dependent forgetting
• Outline context-dependent forgetting


  . Whether the environmental context during encoding and retrieval are different or not

  . Godden and Baddeley

  . Divers either recalled word lists either on land or in water- creating 4 conditions

  . Accuracy was 40% lower in non-matching conditions

  . Cues used at learning were different to those at recall which led to retrieval failure
• Outline state-dependent forgetting


  . Whether physiological state differs during encoding and retrieval

  . Carter and Cassaday

  . Ptpts had to learn words in 2 conditions: normal and alert, drowsy

  . Cassaday and Carter made their ptpts drowsy by giving them anti histamine drugs

  . When internal states didnt match (so when ptpt learned when they were alert and recalled when they were drowsy) recall decreased significantly as the cues weren't present
• What are the strengths?


  Supporting evidence- Range of research from Godden, Baddeeley, Carter and Cassaday. Eyesneck also suggested that retrieval was the main reason for forgetting in LTM. Strength because supporting evidence increases the validity of the explanation. Ecological validity is also increased when findings are applicable to real-life settings, not just lab settings.

  
  

  Real life applications- Even though Baddeley claimed the effect of cues on memory aren't that strong, they're still important. It is a common experience that when we're upstairs, we remember to get something from downstairs, but when we go down, we forget what we need; but then we remember again once we go up. This is an example of how cues are used, when we return to the context we encoded in, we are able to recall. Reinstating the context is also used in Cognitive interviews which increase the accuracy of recall. Therefore suggesting that the use of cues in explaining retrieval failure, is useful in real life situations.
• What are the weaknesses?


  Questioning context effects- Baddeley argues that context effects are not that strong in real life. Contexts have to be very different before an effect is seen. Learning something in one room and recalling it in another will not likely result in forgetting because the contexts are not different enough. This is a weakness because it suggests that real-life applications are not that relevant in explaining forgetting.

  
  

  Recall vs Recognition- Context may refer to the kind of memory being tested. Godden and Baddeley replicated their underwater study, but used recognition instead of recall. They had to determine whether they recognised a word from the list, rather than retrieving it themselves. Performance was the same in all 4 conditions. Further limitation because it suggests that the presence or absence of cues depends on how the memory is being tested.
• Factors affecting eye witness testimony- MISLEADING INFORMATION: Outline and explain the studies on Leading questions


  . Loftus and Palmer

  . Made students watch videos about a car accident

  . They were then asked a critical leading question: "how fast were the cars going when they hit?"

  . The word "hit" provides implications for the speed the cars were going at

  . A different verb was used for each of the 5 groups: "contacted, bumped, smashed, collided"

  . Ptpts suggested the mean speed was 31.8 mph when "contacted was used"

  . For "Smashed" the speed suggested was 40.5 mph

  . The leading question affected the eye witness recall of the event
• What is mean response-bias explanation?


  . Wording of the question has no real effect on the ptpts memories, but just changes how they answer

  . Using the word "smashed" influences the ptpt to choose a higher speed