These components were so-called the Visuo-Spatial Sketchpad and the Phonological Loop. Baddeley and Hitch suggested that these two subsystems were governed by central controlling mechanism, which they termed the Central Executive. The Phonological Loop acts like an inner ear and operates like the loop of an audiotape. It can hold spoken information for about 1-2 seconds. Written words must be transferred into spoken words in order to enter the phonological loop.
Baddeley and Hitch used the term 'working memory' to refer to the part of the memory that is active or working. This could be as simple as playing a game, calculating sums or reading a sentence all of which are collecting data to be stored. The working memory model consists of three parts; these are the central executive, phonological loop and visuo-spatial sketchpad. The central executive controls attention and draws on the other two systems known as the 'slave systems'. The central executive has a limited capacity; in other words it cannot attend to too many things at once.
Discuss the value of the Multi Store Model of memory (12 marks) The MSM of memory consists of four main components: the Attention System (Sensory Store), the Short Term Store (often known as the working memory), the Rehearsal Loop and the Long Term Store. The Attention System filters incoming information. If this information is paid attention to, it gets transferred into the Short Term Store. However, if the information is not acknowledged it is lost/decays. The Rehearsal Loop allows the rehearsal of information resulting in it being transferred into either the Long Term Store, or due to maintenance rehearsal, the information will be able to stay stored in the Short Term Store.
In addition information in the short term memory store is encoded acoustically; this theory is supported by Conrad’s 1964 case study where an experiment was conducted that confirmed Atkinson and Shiffrin’s theory that the STM encodes information acoustically. Their findings showed after rehearsal the info is transferred from the STM to Long term memory store if not rehearsed information is lost through decay. When in the LTM, the material can last for up to a lifetime when rehearsed or is of semantic value. LTM encodes information that is semantic. There are many strong points to consider in terms of the multi store model of memory.
Its input is from eyes or the LTM. The phonological loop consists of two sub- systems; the phonological store, “the inner ear”, which allows acoustically coded information to be stored for a brief period of time (about two seconds), and the articulatory control system, “the inner voice”, which helps maintain information by sub-vocal information. The phonological loop also has a limited capacity. In 2000, Baddeley introduced a new component to the WMM: the episodic buffer. Its purpose is to organize the information received from the other components with information about time and order.
different stores for each sense) Short Term Memory • Duration: 0-18 seconds • Capacity: 7 +/- 2 items • Encoding: mainly auditory Long Term Memory • Duration: Unlimited • Capacity: Unlimited • Encoding: Mainly Semantic (but can be visual and auditory) Evaluation of the Multi-Store Model Strengths Many memory studies provide evidence to support the distinction between STM and LTM (in terms of encoding, duration and capacity). The model can account for primacy & regency effects. The model is influential as it has generated a lot of research into memory. The model is supported by studies of amnesiacs: For example the HM case study. HM is still alive but has marked problems in long-term memory after
As far as coding is concerned, there are also differences between short term and long term memory; short term is acoustic and long term is semantic. The multi-store model of memory is the first attempt into explaining the way that memory works and has led to further research into memory being undertaken but this explanation of memory is overly simplistic due to its one way system of memory. Lab research to support the multi-store memory was carried out by Peterson and Peterson; in their study, participants were presented with a trigram consisting of 3 consonants which they were asked to recall in the correct order after a delay of 3,6,9,12,15 or 18 seconds. Rehearsal of the trigram was prevented by counting backwards in 3s from a random 3 digit number. The findings of Peterson and Peterson’s research were that after 18 seconds, fewer than 10% of the trigrams were remembered by the participants.
Declarative memory is a memory for specific information or facts, which can be sub-divided into Semantic storage for language and general knowledge. This is the kind of memory that is tested in experimental work. The other sub-division is Episodic which is storage for personal events and people. This memory may not be reliable because of memory distortions. In 2000 Schachter et al.
Multi-Store Model of Memory The multi-store model is the explanation for how memories are processed. It explains why only a few things are remembered and why some things are remembered and others aren’t. Atkinson and Schiffrin were the first to describe the multi-store model. They designed a simple diagram to show the multi-store memory: Sensory memory Environmental Stimuli Attention Short-term Memory Maintenance Rehearsal Information Retrieval Elaborate Rehearsal Long-term Memory Retrieval Sensory memory Environmental Stimuli Attention Short-term Memory Maintenance Rehearsal Information Retrieval Elaborate Rehearsal Long-term Memory Retrieval The Multi-store Model has 3 different places for memory storage. Information passes from store to store in a linear way and there are different explanations for forgetting in each store The first store is where sensory memory is processed.
Memory is to do with how we encode, store and retrieve information. The multi-store model of memory was suggested by Atkinson and Shiffrin who said that we have 3 different memory stores: sensory memory, short term memory and long term memory and formed a linear model to demonstrate the process. A key aspect of the model is that the memory stores have different characteristics which include capacity, duration and encoding. Capacity refers to how much information that can be stored, duration is how long the memory lasts and encoding is how the memory is taken in and stored to be recalled later. We have sensory memory stores where information from the outside world is taken in unconsciously so if it is not looked at consciously it can be lost via decay as the duration is very short (possibly up to 2 seconds).