Sensory Memory

Stimuli coming into the memory system from the external environment first register in the sensory store. This holds information for fractions of a second after the physical stimulus is no longer available. Atkinson and Shiffrin proposed three separate stores to accommofate deifferent kinds of imput:

• iconic store for visual input (things we see)
• echoic store for auditory input (things we hear)
• haptic store for tactile input (things we feel/touch)

It is the iconic store that has stimulated the most research interest so we will look at the more closely. According to Baddeley (1988), the purpose of the visual sensory store is to allow us to integrate visual information so that, at a conscious level, we experienc…