The Multistore Model of Memory (Memory)

Question 1

What is coding?

Answer 1

The way information is transformed into a format that can be stored and retrieved from memory.

Question 2

What is capacity?

Answer 2

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

Question 3

What is duration?

Answer 3

The length of time information can be held in memory before decaying/disappearing.

Question 4

What is long term memory?

Answer 4

• Your memory of events that have happened in the past.
• This lasts anywhere from 1 minute to 100 years.
• LTM has potentially unlimited duration and capacity and tends to be coded sensitively.

Question 5

What is short term memory?

Answer 5

• An unitary system
• Your memory for immediate events, measured in seconds and minutes rather than hours and days.
• They disappear until rehearsed.
• STM also has limited capacity of about four items or chunks, and it tends to be coded acoustically.
• It holds limited amounts of information for short periods of time with little processing.
• Sometimes referred to as working memory.

Question 6

What is the capacity of short term memory?

Answer 6

Short term memory capacity —> 7+ or -2

Question 7

What is short term memory duration?

Answer 7

Short term memory duration —> 18-20 seconds

Question 8

How is short term memory coded/encoded

Answer 8

Short term memory coding/encoding —> acoustic - sounds

Question 9

What is the capacity of long term memory?

Answer 9

Long term memory capacity —> infinite / limitless

Question 10

What is long term memory duration?

Answer 10

Long term memory duration —> up to a lifetime

Question 11

How is long term memory coded/encoded?

Answer 11

Long term memory coding/encoding —> semantically - meaning of words

Question 12

What does the multi-store model look like?

Answer 12

• The SENSORY MEMORY gives attention to the SHORT TERM MEMORY.
• The SHORT TERM MEMORY constantly rehearses the information.
• The SHORT TERM MEMORY transfers the information into the LONG TERM MEMORY.
• The LONG TERM MEMORY takes part in retrieval where the information is passed back to SUORT TERM MEMORY.

Question 13

Who came up with the multistore memory model?

Answer 13

Atkinson and Shriffin (1968)

Question 14

What is a model of memory?

Answer 14

• A representation of our memory.
• It helps us to understand how our memory sounds and what it ‘looks like’.

Question 15

What was the study conducted on the coding of short term memory?

Answer 15

Baddeley (1966):
- Participants divided into 4 groups —> acoustically similar words, acoustically dissimilar words, semantically similar words, and semantically dissimilar words.
- Each group was given five words based on their category.
- After hearing the five words, they were asked asked to recall them in the correct order.
- Acoustically similar words were harder to recall.

Question 16

What is strengths of Baddeleys study on the coding of short term memory?

Answer 16

• Showed a clear difference between two memory stores (STM and LTM)

Question 17

What is weaknesses on Baddeleys study on the coding of long term memory?

Answer 17

• This does not represent how we use our STM in every day life, so it lacks ecological validity.

Question 18

What is the study on the capacity of short term memory?

Answer 18

• Miller reviewed psychological research into the capacity of STM and found that people can remember about 7 items, plus or minus 2.
• The span of immediate memory is 7+ or -2.

Question 19

What is the strengths of Millers study against the capacity of short term memory?

Answer 19

• High in validity —> the study has been replicated

Question 20

What is the weakness against Millers study of short term memory?

Answer 20

• The capacity of STM may increase with age and this is not taken into account. (Jacobs)

Question 21

What is the study conducted for the duration of short term memory?

Answer 21

Peterson and Peterson (1959):
- Participants were shown a constant trigram (three letters) and were asked to count backwards in threes to stop them rehearsing the letters —> known as an ‘interference task’.
- At regular intervals, they were asked to recall the trigrams.
- Participants could recall 80% of trigrams after 3 seconds.
- After 18 seconds, less than 10% of trigrams were recalled.

Question 22

What are the strengths of Peterson and Peterson study of the duration of short term memory?

Answer 22

• High internal validity —> set out to test what they wanted to test.
• Standardised —> everyone exposed to trigrams and distraction - which showed that as it progressed less, participants could remember trigrams.

Question 23

What are the weaknesses of Peterson and Peterson study of the duration of short term memory?

Answer 23

• Artificial setting —> doesn’t reflect real life, therefore lacking validity.

Question 24

What is the study conducted on the coding of long term memory?

Answer 24

Baddeley (1966):
- Participants were divided into four groups —> acoustically similar words, acoustically dissimilar words, semantically similar words, semantically dissimilar words.
- After an interval of 20 minutes, participants were asked to recall words in the correct order.
- Recall was much worse for semantically similar words (55% accuracy) than for semantically dissimilar words (85% accuracy) so LTM mainly was semantic coding because it was easier for people to recall words which had different meanings.

Question 25

What is the strengths of Baddeleys study of the coding of long term memory?

Answer 25

• Showed a clear difference between the two memory stores (STM and LTM).

Question 26

What is the weaknesses of Baddeleys study on long term memory?

Answer 26

• Internal validity —> LTM was tested by waiting 20 minutes —> it is questionable,whether this is really testing LTM.

Question 27

What is the study conducted for the duration of long term memory?

Answer 27

Bahrick et al (1975):
- 392 graduates were shown photographs from their high school yearbook.
—> Recognition group: participants had to match the name to the photograph.
—> Recall group: participants were asked to recall the names of the people when shown a photograph.
- In the recognition group, accuracy was 60% after 47 years and in the recall group, the participants were less than 20% accurate after 47 years.
- This shows that certain information types can be remembered over a lifetime and LTM tends to be better when measured by recognition.

Question 28

What is the strengths of Bahrick et al’s study on the duration of long term memory?

Answer 28

• High in external validity as the researchers were investigating meaningful memories.

Question 29

What is the weaknesses of Bahrick et al’s study on the duration of long term memory?

Answer 29

• Extraneous variables —> some participants may have still been in contact with their peers or seen them recently.

Question 30

What is a model of memory?

Answer 30

• A representation of our memory
• It helps us to understand how our memory sounds and what it ‘looks like’.

Question 31

What are the strengths of the multistore model?

Answer 31

• Controlled lab studies on capacity, duration and coding support the existence of a separate short term memory and long term memory, which is the basis of MSM.
• Studies using brain scanning techniques have also demonstrated that there is a difference between STM and LTM. Beardsley (1997) found that the prefrontal cortex is active during STM but not LTM tasks.
• Psychologists have also shown that different areas of the brain are involved in STM and LTM from the studies of individuals with brain damage.
• HM’s personality and intellect remained intact but he couldn’t form new LTM’s, however he could remember things from before the surgery.

Question 32

What are the weaknesses of the MSM model?

Answer 32

• Too simplistic —> suggests that the STM and LTM are single ‘unitary’ stores. However, research does not support this. Research suggests that the working memory (STM) actually is divided into a number of qualitatively relative stores, the same is said of LTM.
• LTM involved more than maintenance rehearsal. Craig and Tulvric (1975) gave participants a list of nouns and asked questions that involved deep or shallow processing.

Question 33

What did Craig and Tulvic (1975) do which is used as a weakness against the MSM, as it suggests the LTM involves more than maintenance rehearsal?

Answer 33

• Craig and Tulvic gave participants a list of nouns and asked questions that involved deep or shallow processing —> asked whether the word was printed in capital letters (shallow processing) or asked whether the word was fitted in a sentence (deep processing).
• The participants remembered more words in the task involving deep processing rather than shallow processing.
• The ‘deep’ or elaborate processing is a key process in creating long term memories.

Question 34

Who is patient KF?

Answer 34

Shallice and Warrington, 1966:
- Patient KF was injured in a motorcycle accident.
- He was able to remember recalled information from his LTM but not STM.
- He was able to remember his visual images, including faces, but he was unable to remember sounds (acoustic information).