As Psychology Essay

One of the key differences amidst the concepts of short-term store and long remembering board is duration. magazine refers to how foresighted a reposition lasts before it is no yener available. ill-judged term memories dont last rattling long. An example of short-term memory in action would be tenseing to remember a s even outsome-digit foretell number that you pret eat up just been given. This is maintained in the short-term memory by REPETITION until the number is dialled, and whence fades once the conversation starts. The representation most tribe keep randomness in their immediate memory for much(prenominal) than than than a few seconds is to rehearse it.So rehearsal is one path of keeping a memory spry. The result of verbal rehearsal is that immediate memory be held in the short-term memory store and eventually become long term. Duration of long-term memory long-term memory refers to memories that last anywhere for 2 hours to coulomb years plus, i. e. anything that isnt short term. Some memories argon very long lasting. For example Shepard (1967) tested duration of long-term memory. He showed players 612 memorable pictures, one at a time. An hour later they were shown some of these pictures among a set of antithetics and showed close perfect re intelligence. Four months later they were still able to recognise 50% of photographs.The material to be remembered was to a greater extent meaningful to the participants and at that placefore the duration of the LTM was better. Key study on duration of immediate memory Lloyd and Margaret Peterson (1959) conducted a catchment basin study of the duration of STM. They enlisted the help of 24 students attending their university. The experimenter said a accordant syllable to the participant followed by a three-digit number (e. g. WRT 303 or SCX 591). The consonant syllable was selected to have no meaning. Immediately after hearing the syllable and number, the participants had to coun t rearward from this number in 3s or 4s until told to stop.Then the participants were asked to recall the nonsense syllable. The solid ground for counting backwards was to stop the participants rehearsing the syllable because rehearsal would aid recall. Each participant was given twain practice trials followed by eight trials. On distributively trial the retention musical interval (time s savet counting backwards) was different. They fix that participants remembered s let downly 90% when there was only a 3-second interval and almost 2% when there was an 18-second interval. This suggests that, when rehearsal is prevented, STM lasts about 20 seconds at most. valuation The findings from the Peterson and Peterson study have been challenged. We might argue that, in this experiment, participants were relying on more than STM alone because they knew they were spillage to be asked to recall the items after an interval filled with a distracting activity. Other look such as marshlan d et al, (1997) has suggested that when participants do not expect to be tested after this interval, forgetting may occur after just 2 seconds. This suggests that our understanding of the duration of STM may not be as clear-cut as origin thought.In fact, more recent research even suggests that the duration of STM is not as short as Peterson and Petersons study would suggest. Nairnes et al (1999) anchor that items could be recalled after as long as 96 seconds. In Nairnes study, participants were asked to recall the akin items across trials, whereas in the earlier study different items were utilize on each trial, which would have led to interference between items, decreasing recall. substance and Encoding Capacity is a measure of how much throw out be held in memory. It is metrical in terms of bits of training such as number of digits.STM has a very express capacity (less than 7 orbs of information) whereas LTM has potentially unlimited capacity. Increasing the capacity of S TM The magic number 7+/-2 George Miller (1956) wrote a memorable article called The magic number seven plus or minus two. He reviewed psychological research and concluded that the span of immediate memory is 7 people female genitalia cope reasonably well with counting seven dots flashed onto a cover song but not many more than this. Miller also run aground out that people can recall 5 discourses as well as they can recall 5 letters we chunk things together and can thus remember more.The size of the chunk matters Simon (1974) found that people had a shorter memory span for larger chunks, such as 8-word phrases, than smaller chunks, such as one-syllable words. military rating Cowan (2001) reviewed a variety of studies on the capacity of STM and concluded that STM is apt(predicate) to be limited to above 4 chunks. This suggests that STM may not be as extensive as was first thought. Vogel et al, (2001) looked at the capacity of STM for optical information and also found that 4 items was about the limit. Encoding in STM and LTM PAGE 23 Encoding is the way information is changed so that it can be stored in memory. entropy enters the brain via the senses. It is then stored in various forms such as visual codes (picture), acoustic forms (sounds), or a semantic form (the meaning of the experience). Information in the STM is mainly encoded acoustically (information is represented as sound) whereas information in LTM tends to be encoded semantically (information is represented by its meaning). Acoustic and semantic convert We can compare the ways information is stored in STM and LTM in terms of encoding of the memory trace. Acoustic coding tough coding information in terms of the way it soundsThe multi-store model of memory The multi-store model of memory (MSM) is an explanation of how memory processes work. The MSM was first severalized by Richard Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin in 1968. There is three stores/components in the MSM which are the sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory. Sensory memory The sensory memory is dispassionate of several stores which are the eyes, ears, nose, etc, and the corresponding areas of the brain. If a persons fear is foc utilize on one of the sensory stores, then the data is transferred to STM. aid is the first measuring stick in remembering something.Short-term memory Information held in STM is in a fragile state. It go away disappear relatively quickly if rehearsal is prevented. Information will also disappear if new information enters STM pushing out the schoolmaster information. This happens because STM has a limited capacity. Long-term memory The second step is moving information from STM to LTM. Atkinson and Shiffrin said that this also happens through rehearsal. The more something is rehearsed the more it will be remembered. This kind of rehearsal is referred to maintenance rehearsal. Evaluation The sensory storeSperling (1920) gave participants a grid of digits and letters fo r 50 milliseconds. They were either asked to write devour all 12 items or they were told they would hear a tone immediately after the exposure and they should just write down that row. When asked to report the whole thing their recall was poorer (5 items recalled, about 42%) then when asked to give one row only (3 items recalled, 75%). This show that information decays rapidly in the sensory store. The serial position effect glass cutter and Cunitz (1966) gave participants a list of 20 words, presented one at a time, and then asked to recall words they could remember.They tended to remember the words from the start of the list (primary effect) and from the end of the list (recency effect) but were less good at recalling words in the middle. The primary effects occur because the first words are best(p) rehearsed and transferred to LTM. The recency effect occurs because these words are in the STM when people start recalling the list. Areas of the brain associated with STM and LTM One way to reason the existence of separate stores in memory is to link STM and LTM to specific areas of the brain.Modern techniques of scanning the brain can be used to take images of the active brain and enable us to cover what piece is active when a person is undertaking particular projections. Research (Beardsley, 1977) has found that the prefrontal cortex is active when individuals are working on a labor in STM. The working memory model Baddeley and becharm (1974) used the term working memory to refer to that bit of memory that you are using when you are working on a complex task which requires you to store information as you go along. The components of the working memory rudimentary executive director director This is the key component of the working memory.The function of the central executive is to direct attention to particular tasks, determining at any time how resources are allocated to tasks. The central executive has a very limited capacity. phonologic loop Th is also has a limited capacity. The phonological loop deals with the auditive information and preserves the order of information. Baddeley (1986) advance subdivided this loop into the phonological store and an articulative process. The phonological store holds the words you hear, like an inner ear. The articulative process is used for words that are heard or seen (inner voice). Visuo- spacial drawing padThe Visuo-spatial sketch pad is used when you have to plan a spatial task (like getting from one room to an otherwise). Visual and/or spatial information is temporary stored here. Visual information is what things looks like and spatial information is the relationship between things. Logie (1995) suggested that the Visuo-spatial sketchpad can be divided into a visual cache (store) and inner scribe which deals with spatial relations. Episodic caramel Baddeley (2000) added the episodic buffer because he realised the model needed a general store. The episodic buffer is an extra stora ge system that has a limited capacity.It integrates information from the central executive, the phonological loop and the Visuo-spatial sketchpad and also from the long-term memory. Evaluation Doing two tasks using the same or different components Hitch and Baddeley (1976) gave participants two tasks to do simultaneously. Task 1 occupied the central executive and task 2 either involved the articulatory loop or both the central executive and articulatory loop. Task 1 was slow-moving when given a task involving both the central executive and articulatory loop. The speed on task 1 was the same whether using the articulatory loop or no extra task.This shows that doing two tasks that involve the same component causes difficulty. demonstrate for the central executive Bunge et al. (2000) used an fmri to see which parts of the brain were most active when participants were doing two tasks (reading a destine and recalling the final word in each sentence). The same brain areas were active in either dual- or single task destines but there was significantly more activation in the dual-task condition indicating that addd demands were reflected in brain activity. Evidence for the Visuo-spatial sketchpad Baddeley et al. (1975b) demonstrated the existence of thee Visuo-spatial sketch pad.Participants were given a visual tracking task (they had to track a moving light with a pointer). At the same time they were given kne of two other tasks task 1 was to describe all the angles on the letter F, task 2 was to perform a verbal task. Task 1 was very difficult but not task 2. This is also evidence connect to the effects of doing two tasks using the same or different components. Evidence for the episodic buffer Baddeley et al. (1987) found that, when participants were shown words and then asked for immediate recall, their execution was much better for sentences (related words) then for unrelated words.This restrains the idea of an immediate memory store for itesms that are neither visual nor phonological. Accuracy of Eye watcher testimony Loftus and Palmer were interested in whether misleading interesting distorted the trueness of an eyewitnesss immediate recall. What did they do? 45 students were shown seven films of different traffic accidents. After each film the participants were given a challengenaire which asked them to describe the accident and then answer a series of specific questions about it. There was one critical question. This question was about how fast were the cars going when they hit each other?One group of participants were given this question whereas the other five groups were given the verbs smashed, collided, bumped or contacted in place of the word hit. What did they find? The group given the world smashed estimated a high speed that the other groups (about 41 mph). The group given the word contacted estimated the bring down speed (about 30 mph). Evaluation Supporting DO LATER (PAGE 33) Factors influencing the trueness of e ye witnessing testimony Many researchers have looked at the relationship between concern and accuracy in eyewitness testimony. Deffenbacher et al. 2004) carried out a meta-analysis of 18 studies published between 1974 and 1997, looking at the effects of heightening anxiety on accuracy of eyewitness recall. From these studies it was clear that there was considerable support for the hypothesis that high levels of stress negativity impacted on the accuracy of eyewitness memory. Anxiety enhances recall Christianson and Hubienette (1993) found when they questioned 58 real witnesses to camber robberies. Those witnesses who were threatened in some way were more accurate in their recall and remembered more detail than those who had been onlookers.This continued to be true even 15 months later. The branch focus effect Johnson and Scott (1976) identified the weapon-focus effect. In their sign experiment, Loftus et al. used two conditions, one involving a weapon and one not. In both conditi ons participants heard a discussion in an adjoining room. In condition 1 a man emerged holding a pen and with grease on his hands. In conditions 2 the discussion was rather more heated and a man emerged holding a paperknife cover in blood. When asked to identify the man from 50 photos, participants in condition 1 were 49% more accurate, compared with 33% accuracy in condition 2.This suggests that the weapon may have distracted attention from the person holding it and thusly explain why eyewitnesses sometimes have poor recall for legitimate details of violent crimes. Evaluation Explaining the apparent contradiction Deffenbacher suggests that this contradiction in research finding could best be explained with reference to the Yerkes-Dodson law, which states that performance improves with summation of arousal up to some optical point then declines with further increase. Many researchers believe that anxiety effects in eye-witness testimony are curvilinear.This means that small to med ium increases in arousal may increase the accuracy of memory, but high levels interfere with accuracy. Those studies which had found improved memory accuracy were most likely dealing with increased arousal indoors the first part of the Yerkes-Dodson curve, whereas studies which showed that accuracy decreases with increased arousal were most likely operating in the second part of the curve. MORE EVALUATION The cognition query Fisher and Geiselman (1992) developed an interviewing technique, the cognitive interview.The original cognitive interview technique could be characterised by four distinct components 1. Report everything (hypermnesia) 2. psychogenic reinstatement of context- the interviewer encourages the interviewee to psychologically recreate the environment and contacts from the original incident. 3. Changing the order- the interviewer may try alternative ways through the timeline of the incident, for example by reversing the order in which events occurred. 4. Changing th e perspective- the interviewee is asked to recall the incident from multiple perspectivesThe first two components are based on the principle that if there is consistency between the effective incident and the recreated situation, there is an increased likeliness that witnesses will recall more detail therefore more accurate in their recall. The latter two components are based on the assumption that information that observed can be retrieved through a number of different routes into an individuals memory. Evaluation Kohnken et al. , (1999) did a meta-analysis of 53 studies found, on average, an increase of 34% in the amount of correct information generated in the cognitive interview compared with example interviewing techniques.Milne and Bull (2002) examined the relative effectiveness of each of the four components of the cognitive interview. undergrad students and children were interviewed using one of the components of the cognitive interview and compared to a control condition (where they were instructed to simply try again). When participants were interviewed using a combination of the components mental reinstatement and report everything their recall was significantly higher than in all other conditions.