Memory Flashcards
A01 - interference theory of forgetting
-suggests forgetting is caused by conflicting memories
-more likely to occur when the material is similar, for example, if you g on holiday to the same destination more than once you may forget on which holiday you went turtle spotting
- proposed mainly as forgetting in the LTM and suggests forgetting appears in the LTM due to info in the LTM combining and interfering with other info during encoding
- two ways interference cab cause forgetting, proactive and retroactive interference
AO1- interference theory of forgetting- pro active
-pro active interferenace is when older info interferes with newer ones
-older information may overwrite newer information for example teacher learnt so many names in past she has difficulty remembering new ones.
-example of pro is keppel and underwoods study
-participants were presented with meaningless three letter constant trigrams at different intervals
-To prevent maintenance rehearsal, the participants had to come backwards in threes before recalling
-Participants typically remember the diagrams that were presented first
-Irrespective of the interval length
-The results suggest proactive interference occurred as memory for the earlier consonance interfered with memory for new consonants due to the similarity of the information presented 
A01- interference of forgetting
-retro active interference is where newer memory interferes with an older one
-e.g teacher learned so many names this year she can’t remember older ones
-example of retroactive is muller,
-stuffy which got ps to learn a list of syllables and the were given an intervening task between describing paintings
-study produces retroactive interference as ps struggle to recall their lists.
-A03 interference of forgetting- strength, supporting evidence
-mcgeoch and McDonald’s
-studies retroactive interference by changing amount of similarity between 2 sets of materials, ps first learnt set of 10 words then they each had to learn another list
- ps recall of the OG list was lower with the ones who had learned similar words
-a strength as is shows interference is strongest when memories are similar
- however this study may lack mundane realism as they used artificial stimuli, ps were required to learn words raging from synonyms, to nonsense syllables and 3 digit numbers.
-we do not usually have to remember such lists in every day life
- so it lacks ecological validity and mundane realism as we may not be able to genrasued these findings to every day life where more meaningful sitmuli is encountered
A03- thory of interference in forgetting- strength, real life applications
-dasher found when people are exposed to rival advertising brands in a short time interval recall, ps struggled to recognise the brands or their message
- considering the millions spent on advertising this presents a big problem but also provides practical ways to overcome this
-by ensuring adverts are spaced significantly far apart from the airing of rival brands or by repeating more in one day rather than over a week with rival brands, therefore preventing adverts from dilution
-this is a strength as interference theory is useful for real life situations as it Helps advertiser as they attempt to to build brands
A03- interference theory, weakness, only explains similar
- only explains forgetting when info is similar and cannot explain why forgetting occurs in everyday life situations
- also forgetting due to similarities doesn’t happen often either suggesting it is only one part of a bigger explanation and over simplified
-fact that there is significant research support for cue dependent forgetting suggests other explanations o processes must be used at which interference theory cannot explain everything
A01- retrieval failure on the absence of cues —reterival failure
-argues forgetting in the LTM is due to insufficient cues
-memory is available but not accessible unless a cue is provided
-cue acts like a trigger that allows us to access memory
-tulving called this the ‘encoding specify principle’ which states that if a cue helps us to recall info it must be present in encoding and reterival but if cue available at coding and reterival differ there will be some forgetting
- he suggested that memory recall is most effective when info present at time of encoding is available during retreival
-two types; context dependent and state dependent
A01 retrieval failure explanation of forgetting - context dependent (external )
- when a retrieval cue may be based on context setting or situation in which info is encoded and retrieved
- Godden and badddelfy
Godden and Baddely carried out study of 18 Deep sea divers working underwater
-divers learned list of words underwater or in land
-then were asked to recall words either underwater or on land
-in two of these conditions the enivoronmental contexts of learning and recall matched whereas in rage other two they did not
Accurate recall was 40% lower in the non matching conditions
A01 retrieval failure explanation of forgetting
- state dependent ( internal)
-state dependent is dependent on mental state you are in at time of encoding can act as cue
- state dependent occurs when a persons internal mental state is different to when encoding information
E.g Goodwin et al asked male voulenteers too remember a list of words when they are either drunk or sober
- the ps then asked to recall list after 24hrs either being drunk or sober depending on condition
-found that when info learnt when drunk is more available in the same state
A03 retrieval failure explanation of forgetting— strength evince
-range of supports evidence
- e.g michale eysecnk argued that reteival failure is perhaps the main reason for forgetting in LTM
- strength as evidence shows reterival failure occur both in real life situations and in highly controlled lab conditions
-strength as increases validity for retrieval failures explanation as finings can be genralised to real life situations
A01 + A03 Godden and Baddely absesnce of cues -supporting evidence strength, metholodgical issues
While its a godden and Baddely research is a strenght due to it increasing the validity of the explanation and supports context dependent
-there are methodological flaws
- Baddely himself criticised E validity of research as he suggested it’s unlikely that we come across such differen contexts in real lie
-also the context may be related to the kind of memory tested
G+ b repeated above study using recognition instead of recall
-s had to say if they recognised a word read to them from a list instead of reteriving it
-when recognition testes there was no context dependent affect, performance was Same in ll condition
-indicated presence or absence of cues only affects memory when you test in particular way
A03 retrieval failure explanation of forgetting strength— real life applications
-had useful applications
-recalling the context of a memory van help trigger to recall this has been effectively used to improve eye witness testimony using CI
-one aspect includes ‘context reinstatement’ where witness will return to crime scene in their mind and imagine environment
-strength as it has produce so much better recall in witnesses than traditional police interviews
AO1 multi store model - proposed by
-Atkinson and sherif which suggests that memory is made up of three key parts
- sensory register, STM and LTM
-model proposes that memories are formed through a sequence
-info passes from one component to next in a linear fashion
AO1 multi store model- components
-info enters our sensory resister via our senses such as sound or sight
- sensory register has a limited duration of less than one sec
Info that is attended to is passed onto the STM
-which has a limited capacity of 7+ or -2 chucks of info
-and limited duration of approx 20 secs
-info in our STM is coded acoustically
-if maintenance rehearsed information is transferred to the long-term memory which has an unlimited capacity and a lifetime duration
-information in long-term memory is coded semantically and can be retrieved from the long-term memory to when required
AO3 multi store model - KF strength with counter
- to support this model from the case of patient KF reported by Shallice and Warrington.
Because of a motorcycle accident it reduced his short-term memory to only one or two digits and had a Regency effect of only one item.
-Yet his memory of events before the accident was relatively normal.
This supports the idea that the stores are separate as proposed by the Mustone model of memory
-and that long-term memory can function even when the short-term memory has become damaged
-however he was able to remember visual images including faces but was unable to remember sounds
-This suggests that there are at least two components in the short-term memory one components of visual information and another for acoustic suggesting that the multi model of memory maybe an oversimplified account for the short-term memory.
AO3 multi store model strength miller
-further support comes from psychological studies
-for example, Miller supports the idea of a limited capacity of 7+ or minus chunks of information in short-term memory
-Peter and Peter also support the idea of a limited duration and short-term memory for approximately 20 seconds and Barwick supports the idea of a lifetime duration and long-term memory
-These studies all support the different elements of the multi model of memory and therefore suggest that the model is an accurate representation of human memory.
-However research examining the multi model of memory is a clear example of experimental reductionism as attempts to explain a complex behaviour by rely on isolated variables operationalised and laboratory experiments such as the capacity of short-term memory duration of short term memeory
AO1 multi store model strength
-evidence comes from Beadsley
-He found the preform of cortex was active during a usage of short-term memory
-And squire found the hippocampus was active during long-term memory tasks
-This suggests that the model is correct in assuming that a separate stores for long-term memory and short-term memory
AO3 multi store model weaknes LTM
-It’s been criticised for suggest suggesting the long-term memory is a unitary store which has been found to be too simplistic
-The model was based on evidence at the time.
The long-term memory has been found to have different types of memories for example semantic=facts episodic=personal information and procedural =motor skills
-This is a weakness as it suggests the MSM is oversimplified and lacks temporal validity.
LTM A01- episodic
-tulving
-Was one of the first cognitive psychologists to realise that the MSMs view of long-term memory was too simplistic
-He suggested that there are three stores in LTM containing quite different types of information
-1st would be episodic
-This is the ability to recall events from our lives E.G like a diary of events
-These are personal events from our lives like what you had for breakfast this morning
-These memories are complex and our time stamped
-We have to make a conscious effort to recall these memories
-for example, it may take a few seconds to record the name of your English teacher, but you are still aware that you are searching for it
LTM A01- semantic
-secondly is semantic memory
-This is our knowledge of the world
-It may include facts
-This memory is often linked to a dictionary or en Encyclopedia
-An example could be what different fruit taste like how to apply to a university etc
- These memories are not timestamp and they are less personal
-They are constantly being added to and developed
LTM A01-procedural
-lastly is procedural memory
- This is the memory for motor actions and skills
-Please give me a record without conscious awareness or effort
-Some examples could be riding a bike, driving a car
-I will need to do these things rely on our procedural memory
LTM A03- brain scans- strength
-A strength for the long-term memory, our brain scans
-These are neuroimaging techniques
-and they show different types of memory in different parts of the brain
-For example tulving et al got participants to perform various memory tasks which their brain was scanned using PET scanners
-He found the episodic and semantic memories were recalled at the pre-frontal cortex
-Episode on the right side
-And semantic on the left
-Additionally, evidence has found that procedural is linked to the cerebellum
- This strong evidence increases the scientific validity of the explanation for different stores in the long-term memory
LTM A03- strength, case studies
-The patient of case HM provides evidence for the distinction between procedural and semantic memories
-He was unable to form new semantic or episodic memories but he could form new procedural memories
-He was able to draw but couldn’t remember learning to do so
-This again increased the validity for different stores in the LTM
-However this case study is unique and it cannot be replicated because he had surgery
-Therefore, there is a difficult to establish reliability of the results and the validity because we can not generalise to the wider population or replicate it
LTM A03- weakness cohen nd squire
-A weakness is that Cohen and Squire disagree with this theory
-They argue that episodic and semantic memories are stored together in one store they call declarative memory
-These can be consciously recalled
- In contrast Cathedral are non-declarative
-Therefore reducing the reliability of talking theory that there are three stores in the long-term memory
-As they suggest that there are two stores
