Memory

Sensory Memory: capacity is limited; duration is 0.5-2 secs; encoding is iconic, haptic and echoic; Research to support from Sperling showed its existence (each item fades during time it takes to recall seen items)

Short Term Memory: capacity is 7+-2 shown by Jacobs/Miller (list of words and digits); duration is 18-30 secs shown by Peterson and Peterson (nonsense trigrams and backwards from 100 in 3s); encoding is mainly acoustic shown by Baddeley (acoustically similar words were mixed up)

Long Term Memory: capacity is unlimited; duration is limitless but subject to decay shown  by Bahrick (90% correct recall after 14 years, 60% correct after 47 years); encoding is semantic shown by Baddeley (sematically similar words were remembered 85% of the time)

Research to support all concepts see above

Real life application to amnesia patients who only lose STM or LTM

Rehearsal is not the only way for info to enter the LTM, also includes high emotion

The model is over simplifies and does not include the types of LTM and the WMM

Central executive: drives the system and allocates resources. Has limited capacity, supported by Baddeley (the letter and number sequences becames less random while a task was being done)

Phonological Loop: deals with auditory info and order of info; divided into phonological store which holds speech based info, and the articulatory control, which rehearses verbal info. Support from Baddeley, Thompson and Buchanan (monosyllabic words were more easily remembered and thus shows the loops ability to remember 2s of info)

Visuo-spatial sketchpad: holds visual and spatial info; divided into visual cache which holds visual data and inner scribe which control arrangement of objects. Supported by Shepard and Feng (there was a correlation between the time taken for the cube nets to be physically folded or mentally folded and that the sketchpad did similar folding)

Episodic Buffer: general storage space. It integrates info from all forms into episodes of info

Research to support as above, and it explains how cognitive processes interact as functioning area

Model is supported by highly controlled lab studies and this undermines the validity of results

Episodic Memory: refers to a group of events over time and space. This is the personal experiences of an individual and the context surrounding them

Semantic Memory: this is what the individual knows about aspects of the world, and knowledge pf facts

Procedural Memory: refers to motor skills and knowing how to do something. They are automatic memories and often motos based. They are resistant to forgetting

Supported by HM case study, HM lost the episodic memory but obtained his procedural memory

Research to support from Hodges and Patterson, who found that alzheimers patients could retain new episodic memories but not semantic memories

Research in this area is based off the brain damaged, meaning the results cannot be generalised to the general public

Interference involves Proactive Interference which is when old memories replace new memories, and Retroactive Interference which is when new memories replace old ones.Retroactive interference is supported by Underwood and Postman (when the condition asked to recall list one after learning a second list has poorer recall.) This research is a strength of the explanation. However, the research is artificial making validity hard. Also, interefernce may be overcome by use of cues and therefore may only be temporary, shown by Godden and Baddeley

Cue dependent forgetting occurs when the environment on recall is different to where the info was learnt. State dependent forgetting occurs when the state or mood you were in is different at recall and learning. The encoding specificity principle means recall will be greater when the stimuli is the same with encoding event and retrieval event. This concept is supported by Godden and Baddeley (where 13.5 words were recalled corrected when environment was the same at both points, compared to only 8.6 words when they were different). This research is a strength of the explanation. It also has a real life application that exams should be sat in the same room as revision occurred. However, context is not normally strong enough to cause differences and the same context and state will never be reached again. There also may be differences depending on the difficulty of the task.

Misleading information is when the question wording may affect the perception of an event. This is supported by the research of Loftus and Palmer. When the word smashed was used in a question the estimated speed was 40.8mph, compared to 31.8mph when the word contacted was used. 

Leading questions influence how we decide to answer. This is supported by Loftus and Zanni who found that changing the word from "the" to "a" increased the confirmation rate by 10%.

Post event discussion means people can mistake others memories for their own. This is supported by Gabbert who found that 71% of people recalled info they had not seen following a discussion.

Anxiety is explained with the Yerkes Dodson Law. As anxiety increases, accuracy of recall also increases, until arousal is too high and the recall performance decreases dramatically. This can be suported by Loftus who found that those who'd seen a man with a weapon were only 33% accurate at identifying the man compared to 49% with those who'd only seen a pen, displaying the weapon focus effect. Christianson and Hubinette found that those who'd been threatened in a bank robbery were more accurate with their recall of events than whose who had only watched.

There is research to support every factor

The findings have a real life application, particularly within the legal system with police interviews

The tasks involved in the research are artificial and therefore may not be appropriate for generalisation, except in Christianson and Hubinette which is a meta analysis. 

Other personal factors may play a role, for example people of a similar gender to the criminal may be better at identifying them. Age also plays a role, as younger people are better at recall than older people.

1) Report everything; include every detail of an event regardless of whether they think it is relevant. This enables all information to be given

2) Context reinstatement; the witness returns mentally to the scene of the crime and tries to reimagine the context to recall more. This is based around cue dependent forgetting. This adds to the information previously recalled.

3) Reverse the order of events. This ensures any expectations and use of schemas is eliminated.

4) Change perspective; the events are recalled from the perspective of another who was also present. This also disrupts the impact of schemas on recall

Geiselman: Those who'd had a cognitive interview were able to correctly identify the bag as blue, despite the leading question being used, saying the bag was green

Research to support from Geiselman 

The technique is time time consuming and requires special training

Kohnken found a 81% increase in correct recall but a 61% increase in incorrect info