MEMORY. - UNIT 1 PSYCHOLOGY AQA A.

MULTI-TSORE MEMORY (MSM) -ATKINSON + SHIFFRIN (68)

3 MAIN COMPONENTS:

• SENSORY MEMORY - which picks up on incoming stimuli's from the enviornment. (visual or auditory)
• SHORT TERM MEMORY- where information is stored, for approximately 20 seconds, generally acoustic information.
• LONG TERM MEMORY- information from the STM is stored here when the rehearsal technique is completed. (when we purposefully, remember the information stored in the STM so that we can RETRIEVE it when necessary).

DURATION, ENCODING & CAPACITY!

STM- duration... 20/30 secs.                    LTM- duration... life time

- encoding... acoustic                            - encoding... semantic

- capacity... 7 ITEMS +/- 2                      - capacity... infinite

RESEARCH TO SUPPORT, CAPACITY:

JACOBS; "TWILIGHT JACOB, ;)"

• METHOD: STRING OF LETTERS OR DIGITS. REPEAT IN SAME ORDER

NUMBER OF LETTERS OR DIGITS INCREASED UNTIL PARTICIPANTS WERE UNABLE TO RECALL CORRECTLY.

• RESULTS... ON AVERAGE 9 DIG AND 7 LETS WERE RECALLED.
• CONCLUSION? JACOBS CONCLUDED STM HAS LIMITIED STORAGE (5-9 ITEMS, HENCE "7 ITEMS +/- 2") - MILLER'S MAGIC NUMBER (56)

INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES EXISTED, AGE. WHY? MEMORY TECHNIQUES, SUCH AS CHUNKING.

• CRITICISMS; :( LACKS ECOLOGICAL VALIDITY, NOT EVERYDAY LIFE. 

BADELLEY - "BAD-LY" (66)

INVESTIGATED, ENCODING.

• METHOD; GIVEN FOUR SETS OF WORDS. ACOUSTICALLY SIMILAR OR DISSIMAR AND SEMANTICALLY SIMILAR AND DISSIMILAR.
• USED "INDEPENDENT GROUPS", 1 GROUP RECALLED IMMEDIATELY, THE OTHER GIVEN 20 MINUTE INTERVAL 
• RESULT...IF RECALLING IMMEDIATELY, P'S HAD PROBLEMS RECALLING ACOUSTICALLY SIMILAR WORDS. IF RECALLING AFTER 20 MINS, THEY HAD PROBLEMS RECALLING SEMANTICALLY SIMILAR WORDS.
• CONCLUSION? THE PATTERN SHOWS THAT STM RELIES ON ACOUSTIC ENCODING AND THE LTM SEMANTIC ENCODING.
• CRITICISMS; LACKS ECOLOGICAL VALIDITY.
• OTHER TYPES OF LTM (EPISODIC MEMORY) THAT MIGHT USE DIFFERENT ENCODING (EG. VISUAL)
• USED INDEPENDENT GROUPS DESIGN - NO CONTROL OVER VARIABLES, EG AGE.

PETERSON& PETERSON :O LOL!

• METHOD? PTS' SHOWN NONSENSE TRIGRAMS (3 CONSTANTS E.G CVM) THEN ASKED TO RECALL AFTER INTERVALS, 3,6,9,12 AND SO ON.

INTERVAL ACTIVITY: ASKED TO COUNT BACKWARDS, THE "INTERFERENCE" TASK, STOPS THEM FROM REPEATING LETTERS ("REHEARSAL")

• RESULTS: AFTER 3 SECS, 80% OF PTS COULD RECALL TRIGRAM. HOWEVER AFTER 18 SECS ONLY 10%.
• CONCLUSION? WHEN REHEARSAL IS PREVENTED, LITTLE INFORMATION CAN STAY PRESENT IN STM - LONGEST TIME IS 18SECS. 

- INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES, SO ESTIMATED DURATION IS 20SECS.

• CRITICISMS :( - TRIGRAMS ARE ARTIFICIAL, NOT ECOLOGICALLY VAILD.
• MORE MEANINGFUL TRIAGRAMS COULD HAVE GOT HIGHER DURATION.
• ONLY ONE TYPE OF STIMIULUS WAS USED.
• :) - POSITIVES; LAB EXP; TIGHTLY CONTROLLED VARIABLES.

PRIMACY EFFECT- :S!

research that showed pts were able to recall first items of a list, rather than those in the middle. The MSM explains that this happens as the first items went through "rhearsal" and where then transferred to the LTM.

if theres an interefernce by other information, the previous unrehearsed information is displaced. 

THE RECENCY EFFECT :/

this is where pts were able to recall last items better than those in the middle. reason being is because the first items were stored in the LTM so were retrieved at recall, and the last items were still present in the STM so were easier to recall.

KORSAKOFFS SYNDROME-

in medical terms, AMNESIA- this is when people can recall recent items, showing that the STM still works; however cannot transfer information to the LTM and LTM is poor. this shows there are separate stores.

CAPACITY OF STM:

• INFLUENEC OF LTM;
• READING ALOUD; IMPROVES RECALL.
• RHYTHMIC GROUPING; WHEN NUMBERS ARE GROUPED TOGETHER, EG. PHONE NUMBERS.
• PRONOUNCIATION TIME; LANGUAGES, SUCH AS ARABIC HAVE LONGER WORDS; THIS CAN AFFECT CAPACITY.

CRITICISMS; :(

• IN THE MODEL INFORMATION IS TRANSFERRED THROUGH REHEARSAL. HOWEVER IN REAL-LIFE PEOPLE DONT SPEND TIME REHEARSING EVERY PIECE OF INFORMATION, EG POSTCODES OR SMELLS. BUT THEY CAN STILL REMEMBER IT.
• OVER-SIMPLIFIED. ASSUMES ONLY 2 STORES,THIS IS SHOWN FROM BRAIN DAMAGED PATIENTS THAT CAN REMEMBER CERTAIN PIECES OF INFORMATION, WHICH SUGGEST THERE ARE SEVERAL STM OR LTM STORES.

COMPONENTS:

• CENTRAL EXECUTIVE: CONTROLS ATTENTION AND THE SUBSIDIARY SYSTEM (SLAVE SYSTEM).
• VISUO-SPATIAL SCRATCHPAD; STORAGE FOR SPATIAL AND VISUAL INFORMATION.
• EPISODIC BUFFER: TEMP STORAGE SYSTEM, ALLOWS INFO FROM THE SUBSIDIARY SYST TO BE COMBINED WITH INFO FROM LTM.
• PHONOLOGICAL LOOP; ARTICULATORY CONTROL SYST FOR VERBAL REHEARSAL. AND STORE FOR ACOUSTICALLY CODED ITEMS.

VISUAL                              LONG TERM MEMORY                                LANGUAGE.

(THIS IS THE FORMATION OF THE BOTTOM HALF OF THE MODEL).

THE CENTRAL EXECUTIVE LOCATED ABOVE, THE OTHER THREE COMPONENTS, WITH THE ABOVE CONNECTED TO THE THREE COMPONENTS USING ARROWS.

:)

• EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT COMPONENTS; FIND SOME OF THESE OUT..
• HAS ADVANTAGE OF MSM DUE TO ITS ABILITY TO PROVIDE MORE COMPLEX EXPLANATION OF MEMORY

:(

• LITTLE EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT THE CENTRAL EXECUTIVE, WHICH IS HIGHLIGHTED AS MOST IMPORTANT COMPONENT.