Memory - Coding, Duration, Capacity & Duration

Question 1

What is Capacity?

Answer 1

The amount of information that can be held in a memory store

Question 2

What is duration?

Answer 2

The length of time information can be held in memory

Question 3

What are the 3 types of memory?

Answer 3

Sensory
Short term
Long term

Question 4

What is the capacity of LTM & how do losses occur?

Answer 4

Considered limitless
Losses happen due to decay & interference

Question 5

What is the capacity of the STM?

Answer 5

Limited - can hold a small amount of information before it’s forgotten

Question 6

What is the experiment demonstrated by Jacobs that tests the capacity of STM?

Answer 6

Serial digit span study

Question 7

What was the procedure of the serial digit span study?

Answer 7

Participants were given a long list of numbers and told to repeat them

TBC

Question 8

What did Jacobs conclude from the serial digit span study?

Answer 8

Showed the average recall & capacity of STM was 7 digits

Question 9

What did Miller say about the capacity of STM?

Answer 9

Suggests we can gold 5-9 (plus/minus 2) objects in STM

Question 10

What is displacement in memory?

Answer 10

When the STM is full so new information that is received pushes out the old information & takes it’s place so it is forgotten

Question 11

How can the capacity of STM be improved?

Answer 11

Chunking - grouping information together
E.g. 1984 instead of 1.9.8.4

Question 12

What is the duration of STM?

Answer 12

Doesn’t last very long
Rehearsal keep the memory active
Verbal rehearsal can allow the memory to become long term

Question 13

What was the study performed by Peterson & Peterson on the duration of STM?

Answer 13

24 Participants had a trigram & were given a number & had to count back from it in 3s for intervals of 3,6,9,12,15 or 18 seconds until they saw a red light appear then they recalled the trigram

Question 14

What did Peterson & Peterson find from their study?

Answer 14

After 3 secs - 80% trigrams recalled correctly
6 secs- 50%
18 secs - 10%

Question 15

What did Peterson & Peterson conclude from their study?

Answer 15

STM is limited to a duration of 18 seconds when rehearsal was prevented

Question 16

What are the strengths of Jacobs study?

Answer 16

Controlled lab environment - good control of EVs
Evidence still used today even though quite old

Question 17

What are the limitations of Jacobs study?

Answer 17

Controlled lab study - artificial environment
Lacks ecological validity - not generalisable to real life
Demand characteristics
Lacks temporal validity - study done 150 years ago

Question 18

What are the strengths of Peterson & Peterson’s study?

Question 19

What are the limitations of Peterson & Peterson’s study?

Answer 19

TBC

Question 20

What is the duration of the LTM?

Answer 20

A lifetime

Question 21

What was the procedure for Bahrick’s study on the duration of LTM?

Answer 21

Had 392 participants ages 17-74 from Ohio, recall people from their high school yearbooks using photo recognition & free recall

Question 22

What were the findings for the photo recognition?

Answer 22

15 yrs after graduation - 90% accurate
48 yrs after graduation - 70% accurate

Question 23

What were the findings for free recall?

Answer 23

15yrs after graduation - 60%
48yrs after graduation - 30%

Question 24

What was the conclusion from Bahrick’s study?

Answer 24

The LTM lasts a long time

Question 25

What is coding?

Answer 25

The format in which information is stored in various memory stores

Question 26

What is acoustic coding?

Answer 26

The coding of the stimulus’ sound

Question 27

What is visual coding?

Answer 27

When the physical appearance of the stimulus is encoded into memory

Question 28

What is semantic coding?

Answer 28

When the meaning of the stimulus is coded into memory

Question 29

What type of coding is the STM associated with?

Answer 29

Acoustic

Question 30

What type of coding is the LTM associated with?

Answer 30

Semantic

Question 31

What research did Baddeley do on the coding of memory?

Answer 31

Gave different lists of words to four groups of participants to remember, participants shown origin words & asked to recall them in correct order

Group 1 - acoustically similar
Group 2 - acoustically dissimilar
Group 3 - semantically similar
Group 4 - semantically dissimilar

Question 32

What were the findings for immediate recall of the words?

Answer 32

Participants tended to do worse with acoustically similar words

Question 33

What were the findings for recall of the words after 20 minutes?

Answer 33

Participants tended to do worse with semantically similar words

Question 34

What did Baddeley conclude from his research?

Answer 34

Suggested information is coded in LTM