Visual Memory is Superior to Auditory Memory Despite Extensive Auditory Training By: Michele Gloede Auditory Perception and Cognition Lab Director: Melissa Gregg, Ph.D. Hello everyone . My name is Michele Gloede and tonight I will be talking about my recent research project about auditory and visual memory performance.

Introduction Recent studies show that recognition memory for various types of sounds is much inferior to memory for pictures of visual objects. One potential reason for this difference is that typical observers have more experience viewing visual objects and scenes, and this results in more finely tuned neural circuits for encoding, storing, or retrieving visual information. Recent research shows that memory for visual objects is robust. Research has documented the remarkable ability of human observers to recognize large sets (10,000) of previously viewed visual pictures with 83% accuracy. Recent studies…..

♫ ♪ ♪ ♫ To evaluate the role of experience, we determined whether providing extensive training with the to-be-remembered sounds equated auditory and visual memory performance. Research Question How much and what type of extensive training with sounds is necessary to equate auditory and visual memory performance? ♫ ♪ ♬♪

This research project included 3 different experiments. Stimuli Used: 64 pictures and 64 sounds of common environmental objects. Auditory Hear Small Dog Barking Visual See Picture of Small Dog This research project included 3 different experiments In all 3 experiments the stimuli used were exactly the same. We used 64 pictures and 64 sounds of common environmental objects. Some other examples of environmental objects included a alarm clock, frog, baby crying, door creaking….

Experiment 1 and 2 Experiment 2 Experiment 1 Study Phase Task: Type in what you hear. Experiment 1 Study Phase Auditory- Hear “Dog Barking Visual - See “Picture of Dog” Test Phase “O” “N” Task: Same or Different? Task: Old or New? High Pitch In experiment 1 and 2 , each experiment started with a visual study followed by a visual test and then a auditory study followed by a auditory test. After, participants then engaged in the auditory training. Experiment 1, the extensive auditory training was different from experiment 2. preceding the training, another auditory study and auditory test was given to test how well the auditory training had an effect on the participants auditory memory. In the Visual Test, participants were shown 32 new sounds and 32 old sounds and were instructed to press “O” on the computer if the picture was an old picture which means they had seen this picture in the visual study or “N” on the computer for new if this had been a new picture they were seeing for the first time and had not been seen previously in the visual study. Experiment 1 training- Which is shown on the left- participants were to Listen to sounds and commit to memory as best as possibly can. Experiment 2 training- Which is shown on the right- Participants were to Listen to sounds presented and type in what they heard. FROG_ Low Pitch

Results for Experiment 1 and 2 2. Experiments 1 and 2 were consistent with previous findings that visual memory is more enduring than auditory memory. Visual memory is significantly better than auditory memory both before and after training As you can see in experiment 1 here, the first bar is the results for the visual memory test. Which shows visual memory is much superior to Auditory memory both before and after training in which we had participants listen to 128 discrimination trials. If you look at the graph in experiment 2 you can see that by changing the training to have participants type in what they hear Auditory memory was slightly higher after training in comparison to the graph for experiment 1, but still visual memory is much more superior.

Experiment 3 Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 1. Study phase 1. Training 1. Training (Same as experiment 2) 2. Test phase 2. Study Phase 3. Training 3. Test Phase Now comes the interesting part. We felt participants needed more exposure to the 64 sounds if we wanted to increase their auditory memory. So we decided to train participants over 3 consecutive days and then test them instead of just doing the experiment over 1 day like we did in experiment 1 and 2. The first day participants would receive the visual study and visual test, then the auditory study and auditory test, then the auditory training which was identical to the training in experiment 2 which participants were to type in what they heard. The second day we had participants come back to the lab and just engage in more training which where the training was identical as it was in day 1. The third day participants received another round of training and then given the auditory study, auditory test and visual test. The visual test was exactly the same as the visual test from day 1, but participants were now trying to remember those original 64 pictures they had seen on day 1 of the visual study.

Results for Experiment 3    First, can everyone please pay attention to the differences in the 2 red bars on the graph which I have pointed to with the smaller arrows. This shows how much our visual memory decays over a period of 3 days. If you take a look at the blue bars they show how much auditory memory has increased after the 3 days of auditory training. Now, if you look at the 2 larger arrows, this shows us that after our 3 days of training and 3 days of visual decay we have equated auditory memory to visual memory. Which means…When participants were presented with the 64 original pictures on the first day of the experiment, they had no further exposure to any of these pictures over the 3 days until they were given the visual test at the end of day 3 where they were then to try and remember the 64 pictures they had been exposed to on day 1. In addition, participants had to receive the extensive auditory training of listening to all 64 original sounds for 3 consecutive days in order to achieve these results Auditory and visual memory performance was similar after 3 days of auditory training. There was a significant interaction between Training (pre vs. post) and Memory Type (auditory vs. visual), There was also significant difference between Auditory and Visual memory before training, p < .05, but not after training, p > .05. 

So, Was Auditory Memory Performance Equated to Visual Memory Performance? = ? So going back to our research question…. How much and what type of extensive training with sounds is necessary to equate auditory and visual memory performance? So, was Auditory memory performance equated to visual memory performance?

YES, but only after 3 days of visual decay and 3 days of extensive auditory training. Collectively, these results suggest that superior visual memory may be due to the greater amount of practice individuals have viewing and actively processing visual objects. Extensive practice with auditory information could increase the capacity of auditory memory, however, the present study suggests this may only be the case under conditions of decreased exposure to visual information.

THE END! Email address : gloed001@rangers.uwp.edu