Working Memory Model

Question 1

Why the wmw and who

Answer 1

BADDELEY AND HITCH
They believed the msm is too simplisitc- specifically the stm memory store. They believed that stm was not a passive store , but several active processes

Question 2

What did Baddeley and hitch believe about stm

Answer 2

Not a passive store, but several active processes.

Question 3

What did Baddeley and hitch discover

Answer 3

• if digit span is really a measure of stm capacity, ppts would be expected to show impaired performance on the reasoning task because their stm would be fully occupied.
• however they found ppts. Made few errors on either.
  —> they concluded that the stm must be made of several different components.

Question 4

The phonological loop

Answer 4

Consists of the phonological store and the articulatory loop

Question 5

The phonological store

Answer 5

• uses sound based code to store information, but this info decays after about 2 secs, unless it is rehearsed by the articulatory loop

Question 6

Articulatory loop

Answer 6

Rehearses info verbally and has a time based capacity of roughly 2 secs.

Question 7

What are the two subsections of the Visio- spatial sketch pad

Answer 7

The visual cache
The inner scribe

Question 8

The visvo- spatial sketch pad

Answer 8

This stores and manipulates visual info, input is from the eyes, or long term mem.

Question 9

The visual cache

Answer 9

Stores visual data

Question 10

The inner scribe

Answer 10

Records the arrangements of objects in the visual field.

Question 11

The central executive

Answer 11

• drives the system
  Decides how attention is directed to particular stores
• allocates the resources to tasks.
  Data arrives here from the senses or the LTM

Question 12

Capacity of the central executive

Answer 12

Has limited storage capacity, so cannot attend to all things at once.

Question 13

The episodic buffer

Answer 13

Takes information from thr other slave systems and adds info about time and order, ready for episodic LTM.

Question 14

Support the wmm comes from clinical evidence.
Shallice and Warrington

Answer 14

Shallice and Warrington 1970 had a case study of patient KF, who had brain damage.
- after this happened KF, had poor stm ability for verbal info but could process visual info.
Therefore this suggests that the phonological loop had been damaged, whilst other areas of the memory were still intact.

Question 15

Limitation of Shallice and Warrington

Answer 15

The clinical evidence from brain damaged ppl may not be reliable, as it concerns unique cases, and therefore one person cannot be generalised.

Question 16

Dual task experiments have been carried out.

Answer 16

Supports the separate existence of the Vss.
Baddeley et al 1975 - he showed that ppts. Had more difficulty doing 2 visual tasks then doing 1 visual and 1 verbal.
- this increased difficulty between the visual tasks is because they are both competing for the same slave system.

Question 17

The concept of ce is vague

Answer 17

Cog. Psychologists suggest that this component of the wmm is unsatisfactory, and doesnt really explain anything.
- it needs to be more specific than being simply “attention”
—> brings in issues with the validity
—> may consists of separate components, meaning it hasn’t been fully explained

Question 18

Brain scanning studies have been conducted.

Answer 18

Braver et al (1975) gave their ppts. Tasks that involve the CE whilst they were having a brain scan
- researchers found greater activity in an area known as the left prefrontal cortex.
As the task became harder, the activity in this area increased.

Supports the idea that the wmm as the demands on the ce increase, it has to work harder
- evidence that the stm is an active process.

Question 19

Logie et al 1989- method

Answer 19

Ppts. Play games and at the same time carry out either a visuospatial distracted task, or a memory distracter task

Question 20

Logie et al results

Answer 20

Visualspatial task impaired performance on spatial aspects of the game.
Verba memory task disrupted performance on verbal elements of the game

Question 21

Logie et al conclusion

Answer 21

Demostrarles existence of separate visuospatial and sound based components of the wmm, and their limited capacities.