Memory WMM

Question 1

Central executive

Answer 1

Central executive
Attentional process that monitors days - limited capacity
Makes decisions and allocates slave systems to task

Question 2

Visuospatial sketchpad

Answer 2

Visuospatial sketchpad

Stores visual/spatial information
Limited capacity about 3/4 objects according to Baddeley

Question 3

Episodic buffer

Answer 3

Episodic buffer

Temporary store for information integrating the visual, spatial and verbal information processed by other stores and maining a sense of time-sequencing (recording events)
Storage component of central executive
Limites capacity of about four chunks
Episodic buffer links working memory to LTM

Question 4

Phonological loop

Answer 4

Phonological loop

Deals with auditory information (acoustic coding) and preserves the order in which information arrives

Phonological loop store: Stores the words you hear

Articulatory control system: Allows maintenance rehearsal in a ‘loop’ to keep them in working memory
Capacity = ‘two seconds’

Question 5

Supporting evidence: Clinical evidence

Answer 5

Clinical evidence: Shallice and Warrington’s cade of patient KF who suffered brain damage that affected his ability to process verbal information but not visual information which suggests that just his phonological loop had been damaged which supports the existence of separate visual and acoustic stores

Question 6

Supporting evidence: Dual task performance:

Answer 6

Dual task performance: Baddely et al study of dual-task performance supports the separate existence of the visuo-spatial sketchpad. Participants had more difficulty doing two visual tasks (tracking a light and describing the letter F) then doing both a visual and verbal task. The increased difficulty is because both visual tasks compete for the same ‘slave system’ whilst a verbal and visual task uses different stores so no competition

Question 7

Refuting evidence

Answer 7

Lack of clarity over the central executive: this component is unsatisfactory and doesn’t explain anything and needs to be more clearly specified than just being simply ‘attention’ - Baddeley “the central executive is the most important but least understood component of working memory”