A Level Psychology - Memory

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Flashcards on A Level Psychology - Memory, created by Czean Holgado on 13/05/2018.
Czean Holgado
Flashcards by Czean Holgado, updated more than 1 year ago
Czean Holgado
Created by Czean Holgado about 6 years ago
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Question Answer
What is coding? Converting information from one format to another
What is Capacity? The amount of information that can be held in a memory store
What is Duration? This is the length of time that information can be held in memory
What was Alan Baddeley's experiment? He asked ppts. to recall lists of words that were acoustically (in terms of sound) or semantically (in terms of meaning) similar or dissimilar.
What did Baddeley find? Immediate recall showed that ppts did worse with acoustically similar words. Recall after a prolonged period of time (20 mins) showed that ppts did worse with semantically similar words. This showed that information is coded semantically in the LTM
What was Jacobs experiment (1887)? Jacobs asked ppts to recall digits, if they got it right, he would add another number to the end and they would have to recall it in the correct order.
What did Jacob find? The mean span for digits was 9.3, but for letters it was 7.3
Describe one research procedure for the Duration of memory. Margaret and Peterson (1959) tested 24 undergraduates. -Each student took part in 8 trials. -they were given consonant syllables and asked to count backwards from a 3 digit number (to prevent mental rehearsal of the syllables) -they were asked to stop counting after a certain amount of time, 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18
Evaluate Alan Baddeley's study into coding. -Artificial stimuli , low mundane realism -Hard to generalise findings to memory tasks -Limited application
Evaluate Jacob's research into capacity -Conducted a long time ago - low control -ppts may have been distracted during test -Lacks internal validity due to this
Evaluate Margaret and Peterson's research into duration. -Had artificial stimuli, lacks mundane realism -also lacks external validity due to this
Describe the features of short-term memory (STM) -limited capacity -coding is mainly acoustic (sounds) -capacity is between 5-9 items -duration is between 18-30 secs
Describe the features of long-term memory (LTM) -permanent -semantic coding (meaning) -has unlimited capacity -memories can be stored for a lifelong duration
Describe the characteristics making up the sensory register -this is the process in which information from a stimulus is picked up from the two different stores -Visual information is coded in the iconic store -Auditory information is coded in the echoic store -In general, the sensory register has a very high capacity
What is maintenance rehearsal? -Repeating material to ourselves many times to ensure that it passes into our LTM
What is retrieval? The process of recalling information
Name one research supporting the lifetime capacity of the LTM Bahrick et al. (1975) -ppts able to recognise names and faces of classmates from over 50 years ago
What is the multi-store model (MSM) ? -Representation of how memory works in terms of three stores: sensory, STM, and LTM, composed by Atkinson and Shriffin. -It shows how memory is transferred from each store, and how it is remembered and forgotten
Describe research evidence into the MSM. -Supported by Baddeley as he showed that there are seperate stores for STM (acoustic) and LTM (semantic) -Craik and Watkins (1973) found that there is more than one type of rehearsal (elaborative rehearsal) which cannot be explained by the MSM
Describe what Shallice and Warrington (1970) found in their case study of KF, who had amnesia -KF's STM was poor when they read out digits to him, but it was much better when he read them out to himself. Other studies of KF suggested that there could be more than one STM store, which contradicts the MSM's unitary (one) STM store.
Endel Tulving viewed the MSM as too simplistic, and proposed that there are actually three LTM stores. What were they? -Episodic -Semantic -Procedural
What is episodic memory? LTM store for personal events - memories of events, people, objects, and places involved in the event -Memories from this store is retrieved with effort and conciouslt
What is semantic memory? LTM store for our knowledge of the world - facts, concepts, meanings of words. -These have to be recalled deliberately.
What is procedural memory? LTM store for learned skills, and knowledge of how to carry out certain actions. These are recalled without conscious or deliberate effort.
What did the studies of Henry Molaison (HM) and Clive Wearing show? -Episodic memory in both were severely impaired, as they had difficulty recalling events that happened to them -However, their semantic and procedural memories seemed to be intact as they both could still tie their shoelaces, walk, speak, and Clive Wearing could still read music, play the piano and sing. -This SUPPORTS Tulving's view that there are several stores in LTM for different types of information.
What did Tulving's brain scan study show? -he scanned ppts. brains as they carried out different memory tasks using a PET scanner, and found that both episodic (right) and semantic (left) memories were recalled in the pre-frontal cortex -This supports the reality of there being separate LTM stores.
What is the working memory model? This is a model representing how information is processed into the short-term memory, consisting of different 'slave systems' and a central decision making system. -It was composed by Baddeley and Hitch
What is the central executive? -this is the part of the WMM responsible for allocating tasks to the slave systems
What is the phonological loop? -This is the part of the WMM that processes information in terms of sound (written and spoken material). There is two sub-divisions: Phonological store - stores words you hear Articulatory process - repeating sounds in a loop to be able to remember words heard
What is the visuo-spatial sketchpad? -This is the part of the WMM that processes visual and spatial information. This is divided into: -the visual cache - stores our visual data -the inner scribe - records the arrangement of objects in our visual field
What is the episodic buffer? This is the third slave system in the WMM, responsible for bringing material from all the other systems into a single memory, creating a bridge between the WM and LTM.
Describe research evidence supporting the WMM. -KF had poor STM ability for verbal information but could process information visually - shows his phonological loop was damaged but other areas not - supports visual and acoustic stores -however this may not be reliable as it concerns patients with traumatic experiences
What did Baddeley's dual task experiment show? -Supports the separate existence of the visuo-spatial sketchpad - participants found it harder to do verbal tasks while doing a visual one
What is interference? When pieces of information conflict another - causing memories to be forgotten, or distorted
What is positive interference? Forgetting newer memories, due to the interruption of older ones - loss of recall is greater when memories are SIMILAR
What is negative interference? Forgetting, or having difficulty recalling previous memories due to newer memories - greater loss of memory if they are similiar
McGeoch and McDonald studied retroactive interference. Describe how they did this. -Ppts had to learn lists of words, then learn a new list. -There were 6 groups that learned different types of lists - words of synonyms, antonyms, three-digit numbers etc -They then had to recall the original list
What did they find? Participants learning synonyms -words with the same meaning had the worst recall - supports retroactive interference - especially when words were SIMILAR
Evaluate this study -Lab experiment so high internal validity and control - results valid and supports the explanation for forgetting Low external validity - has artificial stimuli - low mundane realism, hard to relate to real life
Explain how Baddeley and Hitch supported this. -they asked players to recall names of teams they played in rugby -those who played more matches had worse recall -this supports retroactive interference - more info interferes with older memories - recall of teams not affected by how long ago the match took place but how many matches were played
What is retrieval failure? -It occurs when we don't have the necessary cues to access memory - the memory is stored but the cue has to be given to remember it
What are cues? -information given that allows us to access a memory - this may have been present when learning -Cues can be external - environmental features during the memory -They can be internal - feelings at the time
What is the encoding specificity principle? (ESP) -Proposed by Tulving -states that in order to recall a memory, a cue has to be present when learning it (encoding), as well as when we are recalling it (retrieval)
Godden and Baddeley tested this theory in a study. Describe its procedure. -participants asked to learn words underwater or on land - then asked to recall on land or underwater
What did they find? -Environmental factors affected recall -Non-matching conditions (e.g learn on land - recall underwater) had 40% lower recall -this supports ESP and cues
Carter and Cassaday also did an experiment like this, in which ppts were given drugs/or not when learning (internal cues), then recalled in either condition. What did they find? -Mismatch between internal state produced lower recall - supports ESP
Evaluate research evidence into the encoding specificity principle (ESP) -Both studies support ESP - non-matching conditions produced lower recall -Shows the results are repeatable - increases validity as explanation for forgetting -However, environmental context may not be as important - as it cannot change drastically as being land or unwater
What is eye-witness testimony? -ability of people to remember details of events they witnessed - crimes, accidents etc.
What is misleading information? Incorrect info given to eyewitness that affects recall of the event - this can be a leading question, or happen in post event discussion
What is a leading question? Give an example of one -a question which suggests a certain answer - '' was the knife in his LEFT hand?''
What is post event discussion? -When eyewitnesses discuss what they saw during the event together - influencing recall of the event.
Describe one research procedure that studies 'leading questions'. Loftus and Palmer - ppts watch clips of car accidents. -ppts asked leading question - ''how fast were the cars going when they hit each other'' - hit suggests speed of car -other ppts given words like collided, bumped, smashed instead of 'hit'
What did they find? -Mean speed for the word 'contacted' was 31.8 mph -Mean speed for the word 'smashed' was 40.5 mph -shows leading questions affect recall of events
What is phenomenon memory conformity? List an experiment in which this is supported -This is when eyewitnesses go along with others in a PED to gain social approval, or to be correct in opinion -This is supported by Fiona Gabbert - witnesses watched crime at different angles then discussed - 71% of ppts recalled incorrectly events they did not see but picked up in the discussion
Evaluate research evidence supporting misleading information. Loftus and Palmer - shows leading questions have an effect on memory - shows that eyewitnesses in real life may be affected - so questions have to be phrased more carefully -Loftus and Palmer had artificial task - different to real life witness of crime - emotions may affect recall - may be invalid to represent real life
How does anxiety affect recall? -leads to change in emotional and physical arousal, heart rate, sweatiness, etc -this may lead to increase in alertness and improve memory or prevent us from paying attention to important cues, inhibiting memory
Describe research evidence showing that anxiety has a negative effect on recall. Johnson and Scott - ppts put into 'low' or 'high' anxiety situation -those in high anxiety had a bloody knife involved in an argument
What did they find? -Those in 'high' anxiety situation had worse recall of the man carrying the knife - only 33% able to identify him -this is called the tunnel theory - ppts too focused on weapon as it causes stress, so they don't focus on other cues during the event
Describe research evidence showing that anxiety has a positive effect on recall. Yuille and Cutshall - conducted real life gun shooting in Vancouver in a shop -ppts witnessed owner shooting a thief -ppts asked about details of events straight after and 4-5 months after -they were asked how stressed they were at time on a 7 point scale
What did they find? -Those at high stress were more accurate - in terms of recall of age, height, weight etc -they had 88% accurate recall compared to 75% of less-stressed ppts.
Why can such experiments into effects of anxiety produce ethical issues? -It involves putting participants in high levels of stress, which may cause psychological harm
Evaluate the tunnel theory in terms of research evidence. -Supported by Johnson and Scott -Contradicted by Pickel experiment - handheld items used - scissors, handgun, chicken, wallet - recall worse for chicken than scissors - shows weapon focus effect is due to unusualness of the object rather than the anxiety it produces.
What are the 4 main techniques used in a Cognitive Interview to help the recall of an eyewitness 1) Report everything - every detail of event 2) Reinstate the context - image of environment 3) Reverse the order - reverse order of event 4) Change perspective - view event in other perspective
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