Links to TOK

Evaluate the Multstore Model

- EVALUATE two models or theories of one cognitve process with
reference to research studies
1) Think back to the Mult Store Model of Memory from the BLOA. Briefy describe its key features.
4) What research is there to support the Working Memory Model? (briefy describe method and
results)
5) What are the limitatons of the research AND the model? (Think about your key evaluaton skills,
i.e. McEg. refer to your syllabus)
6) Outline conradictory research that highlights weaknesses in the models explanaton
Lesson 1
Multistore model of memory
Organisation: work in small groups
Read the textbook link: '"!he multistore model of memory', and note that in the
multistore model of memory,.short-term memory (STM) and long-term memory
(lIM) are viewed as two s e ~ r a t e , distinct stores. 1
Glanzer and Cunitz (1966) conducted the
following experiment to see if evidence could be
found for these separate stores.
Participants were presented with a list of
words one at a time. They were asked to recall
the words in any order (called free recall}.
Half the participants recalled the words
immediately after they had memorised them.
The other harf of the participants counted
backwards for 30 seconds before they
recalled the words.
The results are given in the graph on 'the right
FJlEE RECAll AT EAOI SERIAL POSITION
80
- Immediate nail
- - - naU after dIstradIon task
1 5 10 15
SeItaI position of words
(adapkd from GIanm and Omill, 1966)
.....................................................
I In the 'immediate recall' condition, which words were remembered best?
2 Why do you think this happens?
3 In the reca,11 'after distraction' condition, which words are remembered best?
4 What is the main difference in the recall performance of the two groups?
5 How can you explain the difference in the way the two groups performed?
6 00 these results support or challenge the multistore model of memory?
.................................................................
Atkinson and Shiffrin's
multi-store model
Chapter 3 The Cognitive Approach
Theories of memory
The multi-store model
A major consideration in devising a model of memory is to decide just
how many different systems or stores we possess. Multi,store models
assume that we can distinguish distinct and separate stores, each of which
have their own unique characteristics. One of the most influential models
of memory is the two'process model by Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968,
1971). This suggested that incoming information is automatically stored
very briefly in a sensory register. Thereafter, control processes like coding
and rehearsal determine the fate of this information. Material in the
sensory register that is attended to is coded in short,term memory (STM),
and information in STM that is sufficiently rehearsed is coded in long,
term memory (LTM). Note that these different kinds of memory should
not be considered as separate regions or boxes in the brain, but as descrip,
tions of different mental processes.
Incoming
information
Sensory memory
Sensory
memory
Short-term
memory
long-term
memory
If you wave your fingers quickly from side to side before your eyes, you will
see a blur between your fingers. This is because of a very short' lived
memory trace in the visual system. It needs to be short,lived for an
obvious reason (all moving objects would appear blurred). This form of
sensory memory is known as iconic memory, and it is thought to last for less
than a second. Sensory memory for sounds is called echoic memory. Echoic
memory is thought to last for around two seconds. Sensory memory
explains the irritating phenomenon that takes place when someone asks
you a question and you respond 'What?' and then you answer the
question .before you are asked a second time, This is because the sound of
the question hung around in echoic storage long enough for you to figure
out what was asked.
Short .. tenn and Iong-tenn memory
If someone gives us their telephone number, then we know that if we
aren't careful we will quickly forget it. If we can't write this information
down (or otherwise record it) we can repeat (rehearse) it to help us
remember. Of course we can usually remember our own telephone
number and don't seem to need to keep rehearsing this information. This
distinction between information that is quickly forgotten and information
that is relatively permanent is what underpins the STMJLTM distinction
in the two'process model.
71
I
Angles on Psychology
ShorHerm memory is believed to hold about seven 'bits' or chunks of infor-
mation for about 20 seconds without rehearsal. The size of a 'bit' can vary,
and information is often coded acoustically (by sound). The life of the store
can be prolonged through rehearsal. If information is sufficiently rehearsed
it will be transferred to long-term storage. Long.term memory has an
unlimited capacity, information within it is often coded semantically, and it
can last from a few minutes to a lifetime. Let us examine the evidence for
these beliefs in terms of encoding, storage and retrieval mentioned above.
Coding
Evidence suggests that in general, information is coded differently in
STM and LTM. In rehearsing a list one thing we commonly do is repeat
the information to ourselves, over and over. We don't often try to give
meaning to a telephone number we've just looked up before we dial it or
picture the numbers - the sound of it is what seems important for short-
term recall. This is called acoustic coding. On the other hand, in trying to
remember a lecture on memory, the exact words are less important than
what they mean. Meaning is important for long-term recall, and this
involves semantic coding, i.e. coding according to the meaning of words.
There is also considerable evidence to support the view that visual
imagery is often important in LTM too. Information can be coded in STM
and LTM in a variety of ways (for example, the sound of your telephone
ringing is stored in LTM), it is just that usually coding is different.
Storage
The capacity ofLTM is thought to be unlimited. We don't know of anyone
whose memory was so full they couldn't learn anything new. STM, on the
other hand, is limited in the amount of information that it can store.
Remembering 8361 is easy. Remembering 5927482103839 is hard,
precisely because the number is so long. You can test the limits of STM
quite simply by asking a friend to remember number strings of increasing
length. MUler (1956) suggests that most of us can hold between five and
nine chunks of information in STM. In other words, we have about seven
'slots' available in STM in which to store information. Just how much
information we fit into a slot varies according to how well we are able to
organise the information into a meaningful unit or 'chunk'. Consider this:
E
R
I
A
N
o
I
L
L
I
M
A
E
B
o
T
S
T
N
A
W
o
H
W
This grid is hard to recall as 24 separate letters, but easy to recall if chunked
into a meaningful unit. You can do this by starting at the bottom right. hand
comer and working backwards from there. MUler believed that some
people who are able to remember very long strings of numbers do this by
Recency effect
Primacy effect
Position of item in list
The serial position curve
Chapter 3 The Cognitive Approach
organising them into meaningful mathematical units. In this way we can fit
a lot of infonnation into STM, although we can still only recall about seven
chunks. A meaningful chunk can be very large. An experienced chess
player can take a quick look at a game and remember where the pieces are
because they can chunk the pieces into recognisable configurations and
strategies, something an inexperienced player can't do.
Retrieval
lnfonnation in STM is usually retrieved very rapidly or not at all. You can
either remember the telephone number you just looked up, or you've
forgotten it and have to look it up again. It doesn't usually help to sit and
think. Sternberg (1966) measured how long it took people to say whether
or not a particular number was in a list of numbers that they had just
heard. Although a complete search of a full store would typically take
only a few hundred milliseconds, he found people did take a bit longer to
answer the longer the list was that they were initially presented with. This
suggests that STM recall does involve a very rapid search process.
Searches of LTM may be longer and more involved. To be sure, items are
sometimes retrieved immediately (like your phone number), which
indicates a high level of organisation in such a massive store. But sometimes
we have to take time to work our way to a memory. For example, in trying
to recall where you left your keys last night you may reconstruct events:
What state were you in? Who (if anyone) were you with? What rooms did
you visit? etc. This ability to access hard,to#find memories using cues and
other memory 'joggers' seems different to the all or nothing recall that is
often a feature of STM. The section on forgetting in this chapter will
discuss some of the reasons why we may fail to retrieve infonnation.
Evidence for separate STM and LTM
The model provides a conceptual framework that is useful and has
support from a number of sources. A major attraction of the model is that
it can help to explain a finding that is known as the serial position effect.
This refers to the fact that, in tests of free recall, where people are asked
to recall lists of words in any order they like. they typically recall more
words from the end of the list (the recency effect) and from the beginning
of the list (the primacy effect) than they do from the middle. Plotted
graphically the findings give what is known as a serial position curve.
It is suggested that this finding can be explained by reference to STM and
LTM. The infonnation at the beginning enters an empty store and has
more time for rehearsal. Consequendy it may be passed to LTM. As more
infonnation comes in there is less time for rehearsal and so STM is used.
but this rapidly fills up so that the later items in the list push out or
displace the earlier items in the store. The last items are well remem,
bered, therefore, because they are freshly arrived and have not been
73
Angles on Psychology
74
displaced from STM, and the earliest items are able to be recalled from
LTM. Furthermore, Glanzer and Cunitz (1966) found that delaying recall
of the list by 30 seconds destroys the recency effect, the end items being
recalled no better than those in the middle, but it does not damage the
primacy effect. The ability to selectively damage recall and explain these
findings by reference to distinct memory stores is support for the model.
Further support for separate STM and LTM comes from studies of patients
with brain damage causing anterograde amnesia. This form of memory loss
is especially likely if a region of the brain called the hippocampus is damaged
through accident or illness, and results in people effectively being unable to
recall new learning from LTM. Old memories accrued before the injury are
still intact, and STM still functions (for example, conversations are
possible), but new people are never remembered, nor are recent visits from
known friends or family, newspaper articles may be constantly reread
without realising it, etc. Patients also demonstrate the recency effect in free
recall but not the primacy effect (Baddeley and Warrington, 1970). Once
again, then, we have evidence of distinct memory stores, a functioning STM
but impaired LTM. Whether this reflects an inability to form new long, term
memories, or an inability to consciously retrieve these memories once
formed, is still not clear.
42 Chapter 2 Cognitive Psychology: Human Memory
You may be familiar with the
following experience: your mother
is talking to you and she says n Are
you listening to me?" You weren't
listening, but remarkably you are
able to repeat the last few things
she said. This is because that
information is in a sensory memory
store, where it is held for a few
seconds before entering short-term
memory.
procedural knowledge, all enable us to better understand some of the different kinds
of memory performance. For example, it may be that procedural memories are very
long-term but the same is not true of all explicit memories. Understanding the
different kinds of memory enables us to appreciate the research findings better,
especially because memory tests are most likely to test certain kinds of memory
rather than others (e.g. declarative rather than procedural).
Models of Memory
How and why does information get passed from short- to long-term memory? You
meet someone and they tell you their name. Minutes later, you can't recall it! The
information has disappeared from short-term memory because short-term memory
is limited in duration, and the information has not been placed in long-term storage.
But why not? Models or theories of memory aim to explain how the transfer
happens, and why it doesn't happened every time.
The multi-store model of memory
Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968) argued that there are three memory stores: a sensory
store, a short-term store, and a long-term store. According to the theory, information
from the environment is initially received by the sensory stores. Some of this
information is attended to, and processed further,.by the short-term store. In turn,
some of the information processed in the short-term store is transferred to the long-
term store.
In the multi-store model the reason given for the transfer between short- and
long-term memory is because it is rehearsed or repeated verbally. The more
something is rehearsed, the stronger the memory trace. The main emphasis of this
model is on. the structure of memory and on rehearsal.
Multi-stont model of memory
forgetting
Evaluation of the multi-store model
The multi-store model provides a systematic account of the structures and processes
involved in human memory. The notion that there are at least two qualitatively
different kinds of memory store is supported by the evidence described earlier in
this chapter on duration, storage capacity, and the effects of brain damage.
There is also evidence to support the importance of r e h e ~ ~ ~ Consid,er_ the
followfug example given by Henderson (1999): if art experimenter slows dow&the
presentation of words, this would allow the participant to rehearse the words.more
and therefore we would expect to see an increased primacy effect (the words earlier
in the list receive more rehearsal). This is what happens. And if rehearsal is
prevented, for example by asking the participant to count backwards in threes, the
primacy effect disappears-participants remember words at approximately equal
frequency throughout the list. This demonstrates the importance of rehearsal.
there are also criticisms of the model. The two main ones are as
follows: first, the multi-store model proposes that the transfer of information from
short- to long-term memory is through rehearsal. However, in day-to-day life most
people devote very little time to active rehearsal, even though they are constantly
away new information in long-term memory. Rehearsal may describe what
happens when psychologists conduct experiments in laboratories but this isn't true
to life. Consider the Key Study below (which was conducted in a laboratory).
Second, the multi-store model is oversimplified. It assumes there is a single short-
term store and a single long-term store. These assumptions have been disproved.
For example, the evidence we examined from brain-damaged patients suggested
that there were several different short-term stores. There is similar evidence for long-
term memory, as we have also seen. This evidence indicates that the single long-

If participants are given a list of words and told that they are going to be asked to recall
them, they will probably be tempted to "memorise" the words, for example, by repeating
them QVE!f again. What happens if you don't tell the participants you are going to
test their recall? This would be a test of incidental learning, unconscious storage in long-
term memory. One method that has been used to study incidental learning is to present
partidpimts with a list of words and ask them to do something with the words, such as
count the number of letters in each word.
Psychology for AS Level 43
This is what and Jenkins (1973) did. They gave
different groups of participants the same list of nouns to
lear". Some groups were not told that there would be a
memory testgive'1 at the end (incidental learning} whereas
others were pre-warned (intentiona/learning). Different
groups of participants were given different tasks and all
were then given a free recall test:
Ofoourse, we should
about the purpose Of an iOlInlMmlPM HOWever. TTlI"'r,on<I1I
Rating the words for pleasantness.
some extent by asking the _ ... J<............ 1.;,
deception had caused them any distress. If so, thestucw
In reality, howeVer, it is unlikely that the minor deceptionimi01ve6Tn
inddentallearning would be distressing to aJ!YOne. < ,:
Estimating the frequency with which each word is used in the English language .
DErtecting ttreoccurrence of the letters "e" and "g" in the list of words.
Deciding whether the words frtted into certain sentences.
-OeCiaing the part of speech (noun, verb, etc.) appropriate to each word.
If partiCipants were asked to rate pleasantness or rate frequency of usage they must have
usee home 'klnd Qf semantic processing (processing of meaning), whereas those participants
doing the other three tasks did not have to think about the meaning of the words while
processing them. When the list of words was unrelated, recall was 51 % higher after the
semaotic taSks than the non-semantic tasks. When the list of words were related recall was
even h,ighedor the semantic tasks-there was 83% recall. This demonstrates that what
the nature of the processing activity.
< < Sumrisingly, incidental learners recalled the same number of words as intentional
learners. Thus, we can condude that one does not have to consciously remember words to
be able to recall them. Rehearsal may not be necessary but meaning may be the key.
<.
points
'ti What are the advantages and disadvantages of conducting laboratory experiments?
2. Try to think of some real-life examples of incidental and intentional learning.
44 Chapter 2 Cognitive Psychology: Human Memory
Which type of memory (procedural
or declarative) is likely to be tested
in a memory experiment?
term store proposed by Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968) needs to be replaced by at least
two separate long-term memory systems. One of these systems is concerned with
declarative knowledge, and the other with procedural knowledge. Retrieval from
the declarative knowledge system typically involves explicit memory. Retrieval
from the procedural knowledge system typically involves implicit memory.
The working memory model
Perhaps a more accurate representation of short-term memory would ven by
a multi-store model of short-term memory. Baddeley and Hitc 4) described
such a model of short-term or "working" memory (that a of memory which is
used while working on things). According to them, orking memory system
consists of three components:
Central executive: a modality- mponent. It has a limited capacity and
is like attention.
Articulatory-phonolo' loop: the loop is divided into a phonological
store, which is' Y concerned with speech perception, and an articulatory
process, whi linked to speech production.
Visuo- . al sketch pad (sometimes called a scratch pad): this is specialised
fo atial and I or visual coding, a kind of writing pad for visual da
Baddeley and Hitc:h's model of working memory
Rehearsal
Most is known about the articulatory loop, which was studied b "deley,
Thomson, and Buchanan (1975). They asked their participants to 1 sets of five
words immediately in the correct order. Participants' abili 0 this was better
with short words than with long ones, i.e. recall was ction of word length.
Further investigation of this word-length that the participants could
recall as many words as they could read out 10," in two seconds. This suggested
that the capacity of the articulatory 100 etermined by how long it takes to
perform something.
What is the articulatory or gicalloop used for in everyday life? It is used
in reading difficult material, it easier for readers to about
the order of words in tex "or example, and Lewis (1981) gave
participants sentences d and asked them. to
meaningful. Some e sentences were not meaningful
meaningful sent e had been switched round (e.g. {'The tree
birds"). Wl\;'J.Ythe participants were prevented from using
saying something meaningless repeatedly, their ability whether sentences
were meaningful was reduced because they could not re-examine the sentences
repeatedly.