PSYC 305 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: 5,6,7,8, Psychological Testing, Saul Sternberg
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Cognitive Psychology Study Guide
Test 2 (Memory) Spring 2018
Chapters: 5, 6, 7, 8, consciousness
Models/tasks/vocab/people
Short-term/working memory
Short-term/working memory
The relationship between short-term memory and working memory is described differently by
various theories, but it is generally acknowledged that the two concepts are distinct. Working
memory is a theoretical framework that refers to structures and processes used for temporarily
storing and manipulating information.
7 plus or minus 2 (Miller)
The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing
Information is a well-known article written by the late psychologist George Miller in 1956. In this
paper, Miller set out to measure the amount of information that can be held in short-term memory
Chunking
(in psychology or linguistic analysis) group together (connected items or words) so that they can
be stored or processed as single concepts
Mnemonics
the study and development of systems for improving and assisting the memory.
Brown-Peterson task
To prevent rehearsal participants were asked to count backwards in threes or fours from a
specified random number until they saw a red light appear. This is known as the brown peterson
technique. Participants were asked to recall trigrams after intervals of 3, 6, 9, 12, 15 or 18
seconds.
Waugh & Norman, decay vs. interference
Waugh and Norman (1965) conducted a test to determine whether information is really loss from
decay or interference. The presented a list of 16 digits in which the last digit is referred to as the
probe digit and will always occur exactly once in the 16-digit list. The task for subjects was to
report the digit after the probe digit. For example, if the list were 5 1 9 6 3 5 1 4 2 8 6 2 7 3 9 4,
the probe digit would be 4 and the correct answer would be 2 (test item). In the example above,
there are 7 digits proceeding after the test item, therefore it can be assumed that the interfering
item is 7. The independent variable would be the number of interference in each test. Waugh and
Norman manipulated the interfering items as well as the location of the test digit in the list. From
that, we can see that there were many interfering items if the test item occurred early in the list
and vice versa.
The test also included the rate of presenting the digits in order to determine whether the
probability of recalling the test item would be any different. They presented the 16 digits either in
a 1 digit/sec or 4 digit/sec rate. Using the decay theory, a prediction can be made to assume that
performance of the memory should be better for the faster rate of presentation because there
would be less time for information to decay
How is STM stored?—codes
Stages of memory : encoding storage retrieval
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Evidence suggests that this is the principle coding system in short-term memory (STM) is
acoustic coding. When a person is presented with a list of numbers and letters, they will try to
hold them in STM by rehearsing them (verbally). Rehearsal is a verbal process regardless of
whether the list of items is presented acoustically (someone reads them out), or visually (on a
sheet of paper).
STM is stored and retrieved sequentially. For example, if a group of participants are given a list
of words to remember, and then asked to recall the fourth word on the list, participants go through
the list in the order they heard it in order to retrieve the information.
Memory span tasks
Serial position curve—primacy, recency effects
When asked to recall a list of items in any order (free recall), people tend to begin recall with the
end of the list, recalling those items best (the recency effect). Among earlier list items, the first
few items are recalled more frequently than the middle items (the primacy effect).
Sternberg paradigm—serial exhaustive search
Saul Sternberg (1966, 1969) conducted a series of experiments to determine whether people scan
items in short-term memory one at a time (serial processing) or all at once (parallel processing).
In one ... Thus, Sternberg concluded that people perform an exhaustive serial search when
retrieving information from STM. Serial memory processing can be either self-terminating or
exhaustive. Self-terminating implies that comparisons stop abruptly as soon as the target is found,
and then the response is generated. Evidence for this method is found in reaction time studies.
Recall (free, serial) vs. recognition tasks
Baddeley working memory model
Visuo-Spatial Central Executive Phonological
Central executive
The original model of Baddeley & Hitch was composed of three main components; the central
executive which acts as supervisory system and controls the flow of information from and to its
slave systems: the phonological loop and the visuo-spatial sketchpad.
Articulatory or phonological loop; rehearsal buffer
It consists of two parts: a short-term phonological store with auditory memory traces that are
subject to rapid decay and an articulatory rehearsal component (sometimes called the articulatory
loop) that can revive the memory traces. ... This transformation is facilitated by the articulatory
control process.
Visuo-spatial sketchpad/scratchpad
Visuospatial Sketchpad. The visuospatial sketchpad or scratchpad (VSSP) is one of two passive
slave systems in Baddeley's (1986) model of working memory. The VSSP is responsible for the
manipulation and temporary storage of visual and spatial information.
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Episodic Buffer
The original model was updated by Baddeley (2000) after the model failed to explain the results
of various experiments. An additional component was added called the episodic buffer. The
episodic buffer acts as a 'backup' store which communicates with both long-term memory and the
components of working memory.
Dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC)
The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC or DL-PFC) is an area in the prefrontal cortex of the
brain of humans and non-human primates. It is one of the most recently evolved parts of the
human brain. It undergoes a prolonged period of maturation which lasts until adulthood. The
DLPFC is not an anatomical structure, but rather a functional one. It lies in the middle frontal
gyrus of humans (i.e., lateral part of Brodmann's area (BA) 9 and 46. In macaque monkeys, it is
around the principal sulcus (i.e., in Brodmann's area 46). Other sources consider that DLPFC is
attributed anatomically to BA 9 and 46 and BA 8, 9 and 10.
Dual-task paradigms
A dual-task paradigm is a procedure in experimental (neuro)psychology that requires an
individual to perform two tasks simultaneously, in order to compare performance with single-task
conditions.
Operation Span
Performance on simple span tasks usually correlate very highly with complex span tasks, but
complex span tasks often correlate with a wider variety of tasks, including those that tap
attention, than simple span. This demonstration allows you to measure your operation span using
the procedure of Conway & Engle (1996).
Proactive interference—release from PI (think birds)
If the items or pairs to be learned are conceptually related to one another, then proactive
interference has a greater effect. Delos Wickens discovered that proactive interference build up is
released when there is a change to the category of items being learned, leading to increased
processing in short term memory.
Retroactive interference
the tendency of later learning to hinder the memory of previously learned material.
Long-term memory in general, episodic
Larry Squire’s taxonomy
Memory: 2 branches- declarative/explicit and nondeclarative/implicit.
Declarative: 2 branches- facts, events.
Nondeclarative: 4 branches- skills and habits, priming, simple classical conditioning, no
associative learning.
Explicit and implicit memory
Explicit memory is a memory that can be intentionally and consciously recalled. ... The other is
implicit memory, which is an experiential or functional form of memory that cannot be
consciously recalled. This is your memory of how to ride a bike or how to balance
Declarative and nondeclarative memory
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Document Summary
The relationship between short-term memory and working memory is described differently by various theories, but it is generally acknowledged that the two concepts are distinct. Working memory is a theoretical framework that refers to structures and processes used for temporarily storing and manipulating information. The magical number seven, plus or minus two: some limits on our capacity for processing. Information is a well-known article written by the late psychologist george miller in 1956. In this paper, miller set out to measure the amount of information that can be held in short-term memory. Chunking (in psychology or linguistic analysis) group together (connected items or words) so that they can be stored or processed as single concepts. Mnemonics the study and development of systems for improving and assisting the memory. To prevent rehearsal participants were asked to count backwards in threes or fours from a specified random number until they saw a red light appear.
