1. Cognitive Psychology Memory
Objectives:
To be able to define memory
To understand what memory is
To be able to describe coding, capacity and duration of memory.

2. Starter - Discussion How have you used your memory today?
What would happen if you had no memory?
What different kinds of things do you remember?
What use is memory to a cat or dog?
What techniques do you use to improve your memory?
- MSM

3. “Short-term memory and long-term memory”
New information
Specification:
“Short-term memory and long-term memory”
“features of each store: coding, capacity and duration”

4. Key Terms
Coding: Format in which information is stored in different memory stores Capacity: the amount of information that can be held in a memory store Duration: length of time information can be held in memory

5. Key Terms
STM: The limited-capacity memory store. Coding is mainly acoustic (sounds). Capacity is between 5-9 items on average, duration is between seconds LTM: permanent memory store. Coding is mainly semantic (meaning). It has unlimited capacity and can store memories for up to a lifetime.

6. Read and highlight page 5
Page 5: Types of Memory
Read and highlight page 5
You need to understand different types of memory and the difference between coding, capacity & duration.

7. Card Sort activity

8. Short-Term memory – Research on Capacity
LIMITED capacity
18-30 seconds
Key Study: Miller 7+/-2
Give yourself a number 1 or 2
Using the task sheet – carry out the Miller study.
Read the instructions carefully
Number 1’s first, then number 2’s

9. Short-Term memory – Research on Capacity
Research into capacity in short term memory Miller (1966)
Aim?
Method: Participants were given 'sentences' of varying lengths that approximated 'true' English. They were asked to recall words in the correct order given in the sentence.
Findings: The more sense the sentence made, in terms of grammar, the better the recall.
Findings: Participants recalled about seven pieces of information, supporting that the capacity of STM is about 7+/-2
Conclusion?
Criticisms of this laboratory experiment include ecological validity, demand characteristics, experimenter bias, participant variables/individual differences.
LTM - infinite

10. Short-Term memory – Research on Capacity
Chunking – grouping sets of digits or letters into units or chunks
How do you recall your phone number? Do you do it as single digits or in groups of numbers?
Miller (1956) said we can recall 5 words as well as 5 letters, therefore chunking can increase the amount remembered in STM.

11. Chunking - Experiment
Read the following letters… Y E B N O I P D T A L G R C U Try the same thing with this list D A T N O L P I B R E Y C U G Finally… C A R D O G L I T P E N B U Y
Use your knowledge of the capacity of STM to explain why one of these lists is easier than the others.

12. Short-Term memory – Research on Capacity
Evaluation:
P- A limitation of this research is he may have overestimated the capacity of STM
E- for example, Cowan (2001) reviewed other research and concluded that the capacity of STM was actually only about 4 chunks
E – therefore there are inconsistent findings in research into chunking
L- this reduces the reliability of Miller’s research.

13. Research on Duration (STM) – Peterson & Peterson
STM – seconds
How short is it exactly?
Read and highlight pg. 7
Answer the corresponding questions.

14. Research on Duration (STM) – Peterson & Peterson
Evaluation: P -Meaningless stimuli- the stimulus material was artificial. E- Trying to memorise syllables doesn’t reflect real life memories. E – Therefore… L – This means the study lacks external validity because…

15. Starter - whiteboards

16. Research on Duration (LTM) – Bahrick et al (1975)
Page 9 – Key study Using page 46 of the textbook, write up Bahrick’s experiment. Aim: Method: Results: Conclusion: Evaluation:

17. Research on Duration (LTM) – Evaluation
What is better about Bahrick’s study compared to Peterson & Peterson?
Higher external validity, meaningful memories were studied therefore…
What could be a weakness of carrying out research in a natural setting?
Pg. 47

18. Research on coding
What is coding? Refer to your key term list.  Format in which information is stored (acoustic/semantic…) Experiment on coding: Instructions: 1. We need four groups of participants… 2. Each group will be given a different set of words, you need to learn them (30 seconds) 3. you will then be asked to recall them in the same order (write them down on a piece of paper)

19. What do you notice about these 4 lists of words?1 2 3 4
man
pit
great
good
cab
few
large
huge
can
cow
big
hot
cad
pen
safe
cap
sup
broad
thin
mad
bar
long
deep
max
day
tall
strong
mat
fat
foul
cat
rig
wide
old
map
bun
high
late

20. Word lists man pit great good cab few large huge can cow big hot cad
Acoustically similar
B: Control
Acoustically dissimilar C:
Semantically similar
D: Control
Semantically dissimilar
man
pit
great
good
cab
few
large
huge
can
cow
big
hot
cad
pen
safe
cap
sup
broad
thin
mad
bar
long
deep
max
day
tall
strong
mat
fat
foul
cat
rig
wide
old
map
bun
high
late

21. Read and highlight notes on page 8.
Research on coding
Read and highlight notes on page 8.
Can you think of any +/- of the experiment?
Evaluate the research method used.

22. Research on coding
Add onto page 8: If participants were asked to recall the word list after a time interval of 20 minutes (LTM recall) they did WORSE with semantically similar words. This suggests that information is coded semantically in LTM. STM = Acoustically. LTM = Semantically.

23. Task
Outline and evaluate research into the features of STM (coding, capacity and duration) (12 marks)

24. Plenary – STM or LTM?
Coding - Acoustically
STM

25. Plenary – STM or LTM?
Coding Semantically
LTM

26. Plenary – STM or LTM?
Capacity 7+/- 2
STM

27. Plenary – STM or LTM?
Capacity Unlimited
LTM

28. Plenary – STM or LTM?
Bahrick Study
LTM

29. Plenary – STM or LTM?
Peterson & Peterson
STM