STUDIES - Bartlett (1932) Flashcards

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1
Q

Introduction

A
  • One of the first studies to prove existence of schemas and how cultural schemas influence memory
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2
Q

Aim

A
  • Investigate how memory of a story is affected by previous knowledge
  • He wanted to see if cultural background and unfamiliarity with a text would lead to distortion of memory when story was recalled
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3
Q

Procedure

A

SAMPLE

  • British participants unfamiliar with American native story called “The War of Ghosts”

METHOD
Independent measures with random allocation to 2 groups:

  • G1 (repeated reproduction): Participants heard story and were told to reproduce it over various testing occasions
  • G2 (serial reproduction): Participants heard store and were told to really it and repeat it to another participant

VARIABLES

  • IV: Method of reproduction
  • DV: How story was recalled
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4
Q

Results

A
  • No significant difference between the way the groups recalled the story, as both conditions changed it (distortion)
  • Overall remembered main themes in store but changed elements to match schemas and expectations
  • Story remained coherent (structurally) but changed

HAD 3 PATTERNS OF DISTORTION:

1) Assimilation

  • Story became more consistent with participants’ own cultural expectations (details unconsciously changed to fit norms of UK culture)
  • More conventional: Details that could be assimilated retained

2) Levelling

  • Story became shorter with each retelling as they omitted information seen as unimportant

3) Sharpening

  • Changed order of story to make sense of it after changing cultural aspects
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5
Q

Findings

A
  • People remember stories in terms of what makes sense to them
  • Memory is subject to distortions because of schemas
  • Proved that schemas are complex unconscious knowledge structures (major contribution to psychology)
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6
Q

Strengths

A
  • High ecological validity: Several applications and many real-life situations
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7
Q

Limitations

A
  • Uncontrolled methodology
  • Not specific enough:
    1) Procedure: Participants did not receive standardised instructions (e.g. recall time)
    2) Low replicability: Hard to replicate, leading to low reliability (many researchers tried but couldn’t)
  • Low internal validity: IV didn’t affect DV and no CV to observe effect
  • Method of recalling story did not affect the results
  • Culture affected how story was recalled, which should be the IV, but that’d mean that it would be quasi-experiment as culture cannot be manipulated (no cause-and-effect)
  • No control group: Should have Native Americans recall the story to verify that culture was factor that resulted in distortion
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