The multi-store memory model essay

Analyse the multi-Store memory model. 16 marks.

Specification - The multi-store model of memory: sensory register, short-term memory and long-term memory. Features of each store: coding, capacity and duration.

Atkinson and Shiffrin proposed the Multi-store memory model, information passes through each different store in a linear way. The 3 stores are the sensory memory, the short term memory and the long term memory. There are several stores in the sensory memory known as sensory registers, with each register processing information for a different sense, for example the iconic register processes vision, the echoic register processes sound and the haptic register processes touch. The sensory register is the first storage system for incoming information. It has a large capacity however the duration of storage is milliseconds unless attention is given and the information will move to the STM.

Rehearsal maintains information in the STM but due to limited duration (up to 18 seconds) information can still be forgotten (decay) or displaced because of new incoming information as the capacity is limited (7+/-2 items) (displacement). If rehearsed and processed deep enough through elaborative/maintenance rehearsal, information is passed on to the long term memory store which has unlimited capacity and duration. Whilst the LTM encoding is semantic, in other words it is based on meaning, the STM encoding is acoustic. Retrieval of information in the LTM involves information being passed back to…