The findings of the experiment showed that the immediate recall group remembered the first and last words best and the delayed group remembered the words from the beginning of the list best. This suggests that both groups were able to remember words that were stored in the long term memory but words at the end of the list were still in the short term memory. There is considerable research evidence for the distinction between several types of memory-store: sensory memory, short term memory and long term memory. Duration is a big distinction between sensory memory, short term memory and long term memory. The duration for sensory memory can only hold information for a fraction of seconds, an experiment by
(2) 3. Explain one limitation of the multi-store model of memory. (2) 4. Describe one way in which psychologists have investigated the duration of short-term memory. In your answer, you should include details of stimulus materials used, what participants were asked to do and how duration was measured.
An experimental study of a variation of the Stroop Effect: the interaction of an automatic and controlled process and attentional processes on a colour identification task. Abstract Theories suggest that selective attention allows for only one channel of input to be semantically analysed, whilst other information is discarded. It has been stated that much of this is unconscious and automatic; and that these over learned, automatic processes can intrude on a colour identification task. This was examined in a variation of the Stroop Effect test [you need to briefly state what was actually done in the study] and results showed that ink colour identification was slower for a list of colour names than when neutral words were used. This supports that the unconscious semantic processing of words on an unattended channel was intruding upon a task of naming ink colours.
Kahneman (as cited in Edgar, 2007) explains it in the limited capacity theory of attention. According to it, “the brain contains limited-capacity central processor responsible for analyzing incoming information and integrating it to information already held in memory” (Edgar, 2007, pp.11). Thus, when a person tries to do many things at once interference can occur if those things compete for the same pool of resources. However, Macleod (as cited in Edgar, 2007) showed that it is possible to do two things at once without interference. In his study, participants had to carry out a visual and an auditory task and respond to them by saying ‘bip’.
Then the second list of words, which are words not corresponded with the colour and is the controlled process, these are read aloud with the errors and the time taken recorded and compared to the first set of data. These results can prove the hypothesis was supported and that controlled processes are more prone to thinking rather than just doing This experiment has had the aim of testing the effects of automatic and controlled processes in the Stroop effect. The Stroop effect demonstrates performing a controlled process task compared to an automatic process task and outlines the extended time taken to complete the task. An automatic process is a task or process that doesn’t involve much attention or effort to be performed. A controlled process does require undivided attention and an amount of mental effort is usually needed.
Describe and evaluate the Working Memory Model of Memory (12 marks) The working memory model by Baddeley and Hitch in 1974 is an alternative to the multi- store model, which was limited in its description of the STM. It consists of three main components, the first one being the central executive, which has overall control. The central executive is directs attention to two slave systems, the phonological loop and the visual-spatial sketchpad. The central executive has limited capacity but is able to process information from all the sensory systems, e.g. vision, hearing, etc.
The central executive has a limited capacity; in other words it cannot attend to too many things at once. This is supported by the dual task technique in 1976 where participants were given two tasks to do simultaneously. The first task used the central executive which was a simple sentence verification task e.g. participants were asked to answer true or false when shown the sentence B is followed by A. The second task involved the central executive and the phonological loop where participants had to repeat the word 'the' over and over again whilst working out the sentence verification task.
Outline and evaluate the model of working memory In this essay I am going outline what is working memory in terms of psychology and evaluate it in terms of both advantages and limitation of the working memory model. The fact that short-term memory contains both new information and information retrieved from long-term memory has led some psychologists to prefer the term ‘working memory’ (Baddeley and Hitch, 1974; Baddeley, 1986,1992) Working memory model is an alternative to the multi-store model; it is a far more complex explanation of short-term memory. Baddeley and Hitch argued that the short-term memory was made up of several subsystems, each of them have a specialized function, rather than the short-term memory model being a single inflexible store. According to Martin, G. N, Carlson, N.R & Buskist, W. (2006) “According to Baddeley, working memory is a short-term memory system that allows us to retain material for current use and not just for transport into long-term memory.” Baddeley suggested this short-term memory as having three independent components that allow us to store temporarily visuo-spatial material and verbal material. These components were so-called the Visuo-Spatial Sketchpad and the Phonological Loop.
These being linguistic, logical and some factors of spatial intelligence. Other aspects of intelligence included in his theory, which intelligence tests allegedly ignore, include; musical, logical-mathematic, bodily-kinaesthetic, personal, and more familiar linguistic intelligence (Neisser, 1996). Gardner even goes as far to claim that although current psychometric tests measure linguistic, logical and spatial intelligence, the fact that they are pencil and paper tests limit the scope of the measurement. This means that the tests may not measure a persons actual ability in the real world, such as their ability to navigate around a town (spatial ability), or to give a speech (linguistic ability) (Neisser, 1996). Sternberg’s triarchic theory of intelligence also questions the scope of standard intelligence tests (Neisser, 1996).
Secondly storage process: involves entering and maintaining information in memory for a period of time and last of all retrieval process: involves recovering stored information from memory so it can be used. There are three main types of models of memory that demonstrate how our memory processes work including the: Multistore Model (MSM), Working Memory Model (WM) and the Levels of Processing Model (LOP). As such, this essay response will be focussed on the evaluation of MSM & LOP memory models supported the arguments with relevant studies. The multi-store model of memory was proposed by Atkinsn and Shiffrin (1968). The multistore model consists of three memory stores: sensory memory (SM), short term memory (STM) and long term memory (LTM) that is used for different tasks.