Memory - P1 Flashcards

Question

What is the short-term memory store (STM)? - AO1

Answer 1

A limited capacity store of temporary duration - Coding; acoustic (based on sound) - Capacity; between 5-9 (7 + or - 2) items before some forgetting occurs (Cowan argues for around 5) - Duration; about 18s unless the info is rehearsed

Answer 2

Maintenance rehearsal occurs when we repeat (rehearse) material to ourselves. We can keep information in STM as long as we rehearse it - if we rehearse it long enough, it passes into LTM

Answer 3

A permanent memory store - Coding; mostly semantic (i.e. in terms of meaning) - Capacity; potentially unlimited - Duration; potentially up to a lifetime

Answer 4

One strength is research support showing STM and LTM are different - Baddeley (1966) found we tend to mix up words that sound similar when using our STMs; so STM coding = acoustic - but we mix up words that have similar meanings when we use our LTMs; shows LTM coding = semantic - this supports the MSM’s view that these 2 memory stores are separate + independent

Answer 5

- Despite apparent support, the studies tend not to use everyday info (e.g. faces, names). They use digits/letters (Jacobs) or meaningless consonant syllables (Peterson + Peterson) - therefore the MSM may not be a valid model of how memory works in everyday life where memory tends to involve meaningful information

Answer 6

One limitation is evidence suggesting there is more than one STM store - KF had amnesia (Shallice + Warrington 1970), STM recall for digits was poor when he heard them, but much better when he read them - other studies confirm there may also be separate STM store for non-verbal sounds (e.g. noises) - therefore the MSM is wrong to claim there is just one STM store processing diff. types of information

Answer 7

Another limitation is prolonged rehearsal is not needed for STM->LTM transfer - Craik + Watkins (1973) argued there are 2 types of rehearsal called maintenance (amount of rehearsal, described in MSM) + elaborative - elaborative rehearsal is needed for long-term storage. This occurs e.g. when you link info to your existing knowledge, or think about its meaning - suggests that the MSM doesn’t fully explain how long-term storage is achieved

Answer 8

- episodic - semantic - procedural

Answer 9

It’s a long-term memory store for personal events - it includes memories of when the events occurred + of people, objects, places + behaviours involved - memories from this store have to be retrieved consciously and with effort

Answer 10

It’s a long-term memory store for our knowledge of the world - this includes facts + our knowledge of what words and concepts mean - these memories usually also need to be recalled deliberately

Answer 11

It’s a long-term memory store for our knowledge of how to do things - this includes our memories of learned skills - we usually recall these memories without making a conscious or deliberate effort

Answer 12

One strength is case study evidence of different types of LTM - clinical studies of amnesia (HM + Clive Wearing) showed both had difficulty recalling events that had happened to them in their pasts (episodic memory) - but their semantic memories were relatively unaffected (e.g. HM did not need the concept of ‘dog’ explained to him). Procedural memories were also intact (e.g. Clive Wearing still played the piano) - suggests the view that there are diff. memory stores in LTM because one store can be damaged but other stores are unaffected

Answer 13

Researchers lack control in clinical case studies - they don’t know anything about the person’s memory before brain damage - therefore clinical studies are limited in what they can tell us about different types of LTM

Answer 14

One limitation is conflicting findings about types of of LTM and brain areas - Buckner + Peterson (1996) reviews research findings + concluded that semantic memory is located in the left prefrontal cortex and episodic with right prefrontal cortex - but other studies (e.g. Tulving et al. 1994) found that semantic memory was associated with the right prefrontal cortex + the reverse for episodic memory - this challenges any neurophysiological evidence to support types of memory as there’s poor agreement in where each type might be located

Answer 15

Another strength is helping people with memory problems - memory loss in old age is specific to episodic memory - it is harder to recall memories of recent experiences although past episodic memories are intact - Belleville et al. (2006) devised an intervention for older people targeting episodic memory, which improved their memory compared to a control group - this shows that distinguishing between types of LTM enables specific treatments to be developed

Answer 16

The WMM is a model of STM - Baddeley + Hitch created this model - the WMM is concerned with the ‘mental space’ that is active when, for example, working on an arithmetic problem or playing chess or comprehending language, etc.

Answer 17

It allocates subsystems - supervisory role- monitors incoming data, directs attention + allocates subsystems to tasks - it has a very limited storage capacity

Answer 18

Coding is flexible capacity is very limited

Answer 19

Consists of a phonological store and an articulating process. PL deals with auditory info and preserves the order in which the info arrives. It’s subdivided into: - phonological store; stores the words you hear - articulating process; allows maintenance rehearsal (repeating sounds to keep them in WM while they are needed)

Answer 20

Coding is acoustic Capacity is about 2 seconds’ worth of what you can say

Answer 21

Stores visual and/or spatial info when required (e.g. recalling how many windows your house has). Logie (1995) subdivided the VSS into: - visual cache; stores visual data - inner scribe; records arrangement of objects in visual field

Answer 22

Coding is visual and spatial Capacity is 3 or 4 objects

Answer 23

It is a temporary storage It was added in 2000. Its is a temporary store for info. Integrates visual, spatial + verbal info from other stores - maintains sense of time sequencing - recording events (episodes) that are happening - links to LTM

Answer 24

Coding is flexible Capacity is about 4 ‘chunks’

Answer 25

One strength is support from clinical evidence - for example, Shallice + Warrington (1970) studies patient KF who had a brain injury - his STM for auditory info was poor (damaged PL) but he could process visual info normally (intact VSS) - this supports WMM view that there are separate visual + acoustic memory stores

Answer 26

KF may have had other impairments which explained poor memory performance, apart from damage to his PL - this challenges evidence from clinical studies of brain injury

Answer 27

Another strength is that dual task performance studies support the VSS - Baddeley et al.’s (1975) participants found it harder to carry out 2 visual tasks at the same time than do a verbal + visual task together (same for 2 verbal tasks) - this is because both visual tasks compete for the same subsystem (VSS). There is no competition with a verbal + visual task - therefore there must be a separate system that processes visual input (VSS) + also a separate system for verbal processes (PL)

Answer 28

One limitation is a lack of clarity over the central executive - Baddeley (2003) said the CE was the most important but least understood component of working memory - there must be more to the CE ‘attention’ e.g. it’s made up of separate subcomponents - therefore the CE is an unsatisfactory component + this challenges the integrity of the model

Answer 29

It is forgetting because one memory blocks another, causing one or body memories to be distorted or forgotten

Answer 30

As interference is when two pieces of information disrupt each other, forgetting occurs in LTM because we can’t get access to memories even though they are available

Answer 31

It is when forgetting occurs when older memories, already stored, disrupt the recall of newer memories - the degree of forgetting is greater when the memories are similar

Answer 32

It is when forgetting occurs when newer memories disrupt the recall of older memories already stored - the degree of forgetting is again greater when the memories are similar

Answer 33

This may be because: - in PI previously stored info makes new info more difficult to store - in RI new info overwrites previous memories which are similar

Answer 34

McGeoch and McDonald (1931) - effects of similarity - participants were asked to learn a list of word to 100% accuracy (i.e. could recall them perfectly)

Answer 35

Participants were given a new list to learn. The new material in the degree to which it was similar to the old: - Group 1; synonyms - same meaning as OG - Group 2; antonyms - opposite meaning as OG - Group 3; unrelated - unrelated to OG - Group 4; consonant syllables - Group 5; three-digit numbers - Group 6; no new list - participants just tested (control condition)

Answer 36

- performance depended in the nature of the second list. The most similar material (synonyms) produced the worst recall - this shows that interference is the strongest when the memories are similar - as to progress down the group, interference became weaker

Answer 37

One strength is some support from interference in real- world situations - Baddeley + Hitch (1977) asked rugby players to recall names of teams they’d played against during a rugby session - players didn’t play same num of games (injuries). Those who played most (more interference) had poorest recall - shows that interference operates in some everyday situations, increasing validity of theory

Answer 38

- interference in everyday situations is unusual because the necessary conditions are relatively rare e.g. similarity of memories/learning doesn’t occur often - therefore most everyday forgetting may be better explained by other theories (e.g. retrieval failure due to lack of cues)

Answer 39

One limitation is that interference effects may be overcome using cues - Tulving + Psotka (1971) gave participants lists of words organised into categories (not told what they were) - recall of first list was 70% but fell with each new list (interference). When given a cues recall test ( names of categories) recall rose again to 70% - shows that interference causes just a temporary loss of access to material still in LTM - not predicted by theory

Answer 40

Another strength is support from drug studies - material learned just before taking diazepam recalled better than a placebo group one week later - this is retrograde facilitation (Coenen + Van Luuhtelaar 1997) - drug stopped new info reaching brain areas that processes memories, so it could not retroactively interfere with stored info (Wixted) - shows the forgetting is due to interference - reducing the interference reduced the forgetting

Answer 41

A form of forgetting. It occurs when we don’t have the necessary cues to access memory - the memory is available but not accessible unless a suitable cue is provided

Answer 42

It’s a ‘trigger’ of info that allows us to access a memory - such cues may be meaningful or may be indirectly linked by being encoded at the time of learning - indirect cues may be external (environmental context) or internal (mood or degree of drunkenness)

Answer 43

• created by Tulving in 1983 Cues help retrieval if the same ones are present both at encoding (when we learn the material) and at retrieval (when we are recalling it) - if cues available at encoding + retrieval are different ( or if cues are entirely absent) there will be some forgetting

Answer 44

Meaningful links - the ‘cue’ STM leads you to recall lots of material about short-term memory Not meaningful links: - Context-dependent forgetting; recall depends on external cue (e.g. weather or a place) - State-dependent forgetting; recall depends on internal cue (e.g. feeling upset, being drunk)

Answer 45

Deep-sea divers learned word lists + were later asked to recall them: • condition 1; learn on land + recall on land • condition 2; learn on land + recall underwater • condition 3; learn underwater + recall on land • condition 4; learn underwater + recall underwater

Answer 46

- Accurate recall was 40% lower in conditions 2 and 3 (mismatched contexts) than in conditions 1 and 4 (matched contexts) - Retrieval failure was due to absence of encoded context cues at time of recall - material was not accessible (i.e. forgotten)

Answer 47

Participants learned lists of words/phrases + later recalled them: * condition 1; learn on drug + recall on drug * condition 2; learn on drug + recall not on drug * condition 3; learn not on drug + recall on drug * condition 4; learn not on drug + recall not on drug

Answer 48

- Recall was significantly worse in conditions 2 and 3 (mismatched contexts) than in conditions 1 and 4 (matched contexts) - When cues at encoding are absent at retrieval (e.g. you’re drowsy when recalling material but had been alert when you learned it) then there is more forgetting

Answer 49

One strength is that retrieval cues have real-world application - people often go to another room to get an item but forget what they wanted, but they remember again when they go back to original room - when we have trouble remembering something, it’s probably worth renaming effort to recall environment in which you learned it first

Answer 50

Another strength is the impressive range of supporting evidence - E.g. Godden + Baddeley (divers) and Carter + Cassidy (drugs) show the lack of cues at recall leads to everyday forgetting - Eysenck + Keane (2010) agree retrieval failure is perhaps the main reason for forgetting in LTM - this evidence shows retrieval failure due to lack of cues occurs in everyday life as well as in highly controlled labs

Answer 51

- Baddeley (1997) argues that different contexts have to be very different indeed before an effect is seen (e.g. on land vs underwater). Learning something in one room + recalling in another is unlikely to result in much forgetting because the environments aren’t different enough - this means retrieval failure due to lack of contextual cues may not explain much everyday forgetting

Answer 52

One limitation is that context effects vary in recall and recognition - Godden + Baddeley (1980) replicated their underwater experiment using a recognition test instead of recall - there was no context-dependent effect. Findings were the same in all 4 conditions whether the contexts for learning + recall matched or not - suggests that retrieval failure is a limited explanation for forgetting because it only applies when a person has to recall info rather than recognise it

Answer 53

The ability of people to remember the details of events such as accidents + crimes, which they themselves have observed. Accuracy of EWT can be affected by factors such as misleading information and anxiety

Answer 54

Incorrect info given to an eyewitness usually after the event (hence called ‘post-event information). It can take many forms, such as leading questions and post-event discussion between co-witnesses and/or other people

Answer 55

A question which, because of the way it’s phrased, suggests a certain answer

Answer 56

Occurs when there’s more than one witness to an event. Witnesses may discuss what they have seen with a co-witness or with other people - this may influence the accuracy of each witness' recall of the event

Answer 57

- 45 participants (students) watched film clips of car accidents and then answered questions about speed. Critical question: ‘About how fast were the cars going when they hit each other?’ - 5 groups of participants, each given a different verb in the critical question: hit, contacted, bumped, collided or smashed

Answer 58

- the verb ‘contacted’ produced mean estimated speed of 31.8 mph. For verb ‘smashed’, mean was 40.5 mph - the leading question (verb) biased eyewitnesses recall of an event. The verb ‘smashed’ suggested a faster speed of the car than ‘contacted’

Answer 59

- Response-bias explanation - Substitution explanation

Answer 60

Wording of a question has no enduring effect on an eyewitness’s memory of an event, but influences the kind of answer given

Answer 61

Wording of a question does affect eyewitness memory, it interferes with the original memory, distorting its accuracy

Answer 62

- paired participants watched a video of the same crime, but filmed so each participant could see elements in the event that the other couldn’t - both participants discussed what they had seen in the video before individually competing a test of recall

Answer 63

- 71% of participants wrongly recalled aspects of the event they didn’t see in the video but had heard in the discussion - control group; there was no discussion + no subsequent errors - this was evidence of memory conformity

Answer 64

- Memory contamination - Memory conformity

Answer 65

When co-witnesses discuss a crime, they mix (mis)information from other witnesses with their own memories

Answer 66

Witnesses go along with each other to win social approval or because they believe the other witnesses are right

Answer 67

One strength is real-world applications in the criminal justice system - consequences of inaccurate EWT are serious. Loftus (1975) argues police officers should be careful in phrasing questions to witnesses because if distorting effects - psychologists are sometimes expert witnesses in trials + explain limits of EWT to juries - therefore psychologists can improve how legal system works + protect innocent from faulty convictions based on unreliable EWT

Answer 68

- Loftus + Palmer showed film clips - a different experience from a real event (less stress). Participants are all less concerned about effects of their responses in a lab study (Foster et al. 1994) - therefore researchers may be too pessimistic about effects of misleading info - EWT may be more reliable than studies suggest

Answer 69

One limitation of the substitution explanation is evidence challenging it - Sutherland + Hayne (2001) found their participants recalled central details of an event better than peripheral ones, even when asked misleading questions - this is presumably because their attention was focused on ventral features + these memories were relatively resistant to misleading info - therefore the original memory if even survived + was not distorted, which isn’t predicted by substitution explanation

Answer 70

Another limitation is that evidence doesn’t support memory conformity - Skagerberg + Wright’s (2008) participants discussed film clips they’d seen - participants recalled a ‘blend’ of what they’d seen + what they’d heard from co-witnesses, rather than one or the other - suggests that memory itself is distorted through contamination by post-event discussion and isn’t the result of memory conformity

Answer 71

A state of emotional + physical arousal - the emotions include having worried thoughts and feeling if tension - physical changes are an increased heart rate and sweatiness Anxiety is a normal reaction to stressful situations, but can affect the accuracy + detail of eyewitness testimony

Answer 72

When a crime involves a weapon, this creates anxiety. A witness’s attention is then focused on the weapon, leaving less attention for other details of the event

Answer 73

Participants sat in waiting room believing they were going to take part in lab study * low-anxiety condition - participants heard a casual conversation and then saw a man walk through waiting room carrying pen with grease on his hands * high-anxiety condition - heated argument was accompanied by sound of breaking glass. A man walked through room holding knife covered in blood - participants were later asked to pick man from a set of 50 photographs

Answer 74

- 49% of participants in low-anxiety condition + 33% of high anxiety participants were able to identify him - the tunnel theory of memory argues that people have enhanced memory for central events. Weapon focus as a result of anxiety can have this effect

Answer 75

In an actual crime a gun-shop owner shot thief dead. There were 21 witnesses, 13 agreed to participate in study - participants were interviewed 4-5 months after incident. The info recalled was compared to police interviews at time of shooting - witnesses rated how stressed they felt at time of the incident

Answer 76

- witnesses were very accurate in what they recalled + there was little change after 5 months. Some details were less accurate, e.g. age/weight/height - participants who reported highest levels of stress were most accurate (~88% compared to 75% for less-stressed group) - anxiety doesn’t appear to reduce accuracy of EWT for a real-world event + may even enhance it

Answer 77

Yerkes + Dodson (1908) argue that the relationship between performance and + arousal/stress is an inverted U on graph

Answer 78

Deffenbacher (1983) reviewed 21 studies of EWT with contradictory findings on effect of anxiety in recall - he suggested the Yerkes-Dodson effect could explain this - both low + high levels of anxiety produce poor recall whereas optimum levels can lead to very good recall

Answer 79

One limitation is that anxiety may not be relevant to weapon focus - Johnson + Scott’s participants may have focused on the weapon not because they were anxious but because they were surprised - Pickel (1998) found accuracy in identifying the ‘criminal’ was poorest when object in their hand was unexpected/unusual - suggests the weapons effect is due to unusualness rather than anxiety/threat + so tells us nothing about the specific effects of anxiety on recall

Answer 80

One strength is supporting evidence for negative effects -Valentine + Mesout (2009) used heart rate (objective measure) to divide visitors to the London Dungeon’s Labyrinth into low- and high- anxiety groups - high-anxiety participants were less accurate than low-anxiety in describing + identifying a target person - supports the claim that anxiety has a negative effect on immediate eyewitness recall of a stressful event

Answer 81

Another strength is supporting evidence for positive effects - Christianson + Hübinette 1993) interviewed actual witnesses to bank robberies - some were direct victims (high anxiety) others were bystanders (low) - found more than 75% accurate recall across all witnesses. Direct victims (most anxious) were even more accurate - suggests anxiety doesn’t affect accuracy of eyewitness recall + may even enhance it

Answer 82

- Christianson + Hübinette interviewed witnesses long after the event. Many things happened that the researchers couldn’t control (e.g. post-event discussions) - therefore lack of control over confounding variables may be responsible for the (in)accuracy of recall, not anxiety

Answer 83

A method of interviewing eyewitnesses to help them retrieve more accurate memories. It uses 4 main techniques, all based on evidence based psychological knowledge of human memory

Answer 84

- Fisher and Geiselman (1992) claim that EWT + could be improved if the police used techniques based on psychological insight into how memory works. - They called it the cognitive interview to indicate its foundation in cognitive psychology. - Rapport (understanding) is established with the interviewee using four main techniques.

Answer 85

Report everything, reinstate the context, reverse the order and change perspective.

Answer 86

- Witnesses are encouraged to include every detail of an event, even if it seems irrelevant or the witness is not confident about it. - Seemingly trivial details could be important and may trigger other memories.

Answer 87

- The witness returns to the original crime scene in their mind and imagines the environment, e.g. the weather, what they could see and their emotions, e.g. what they felt. - This is based on the concept of context-dependent forgetting. Cues from the context may trigger recall.

Answer 88

- Events are recorded in a different order (e.g. from the end back to the beginning or from the middle to the beginning) - This prevents people basing their descriptions on their expectations of how the event must have happened, rather than the actual events - It also prevents dishonesty (harder to produce an untruthful account if it has been reversed)

Answer 89

- Witnesses recall the incident from other people's perspectives. How would it have appeared to another witness or to the perpetrator? - This prevents the influence of expectations and schema on recall. Schema are packages of information developed through experience. - - They generate A framework for interpreting incoming information

Answer 90

- Fisher et al. (1987) developed additional elements of the CI - This includes a focus on the social dynamics of the interaction (e.g. knowing when to establish and relinquish eye contact) - The enhanced CI also includes ideas such as reducing the eyewitnesses anxiety, minimizing distractions, getting the eyewitness to speak slowly and asking open-ended questions.

Answer 91

One strength is research support for the effectiveness - A meta analysis by Köhnken et al. (1999) combined data from 55 studies comparing CI ( +ECI) with the standard police interview - The CI produced an average of 41% more correct information than the standard interview. Only four studies showed no difference - Shows that the CI is effective in helping witnesses recall information that is available but not accessible

Answer 92

- Köhnken et al. also found increases in the amount of inaccurate information, especially in the ECI (quality over quantity - Therefore police officers need to be very careful how they treat eyewitness evidence from CIs/ECIs

Answer 93

One limitation is that some elements of the CI are more useful than others - Milne + Bull (2002) found that each individual technique of the CI alone produced more information than the standard police interview - But they also found that combining report everything and reinstate the context produced better recall than any other technique, individually or combined - This casts doubt on the credibility of the overall CI because some of the techniques are less effective than the others

Answer 94

Another limitation of the CI is that it is time-consuming - Police are reluctant to use the CI because it takes more time than the standard police interview (e.g. to establish rapport and allow the witness to relax) - The CI also requires special training, but many forces do not have the resources to provide more than a few hours’ training (Kebbell + Wagstaff 1997) - This suggests that the complete CI is not realistic for police officers to use, and it might be better to focus on just a few key elements