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The Multi Store Model (Atkinson & Shiffrin) 1968 - Coggle Diagram
The Multi Store Model (Atkinson & Shiffrin) 1968
The first real attempt to describe both the structure and process of memory in a formal model.
A model of memory isn't 'genuinely' how our memory is structured - its just a representation. Eg the London tube map, not geographically accurate but gives you an idea of where you're going.
Sensory register
The first part of our memory where information is held.
Whenever we see, taste, smell, hear or feel something ( the environmental stimuli) it goes to our sensory register.
Information is held in the same format in which it's received so it is
modality specific
.
Small capacity
and its constantly receiving information. The duration is very brief (less than half a second) and we only pay attention to a small amount of this information Eg if it stands out in some way. Information from the sensory register will be lost if it's not attended to.
If we pay attention to something, it is transferred into our STM. Information is held in our STM to be used for things that we need immediately like repeating back what someone has just said to you or instructions for how to get somewhere.
The capacity of the STM is limited (between 15-30 seconds) so we therefore need to carry out
maintenance rehearsal
by repeating of revising information to keep it in our STM.
If we rehearse it sticks in our mind. Information will disappear from STM if new information enters it, this is called displacement.
If we continuously perform maintenance rehearsal and repeat information over and over again, then it will eventually be encoded into our LTM.
To use the information in our LTM, we need to retrieve it. Retrieval transfers information from our our LTM to our STM.
EVIDENCE
Clinical Evidence
Studies of brain-damaged patients
HM
- Suffered from amnesia following brain surgery for epilepsy resulting in severe impairment to his LTM while his STM was largely intact.
Clive Wearing
suffered from long term memory impairment following encephalitis (a viral infection which damaged part of his brain) but his STM stayed relatively unaffected.
Both case studies indicate that STM and LTM are stored separately, and that memory problems may be due to problems with transferring information from STM to LTM.
MSM may be too simplistic??!!
Shallice & Warrington
(1974) report the case of patient KF who suffered brain damage as a result of a motorcycle accident.
After the accident KF showed impairments to STM for verbal information but his visual STM was unaffected.
Suggests that the STM is made up of a number of different stores rather than one unitary store.
Experimental Evidence
Glanzer & Cunitz
demonstrated the serial position effect. They found that participants recalled more words from the beginning and end of a list but fewer from the middle.
Evidence from neuroimaging studies
Beardsley
(1997)
Used PET scans to show that the prefrontal cortex is active during STM but not LTM tasks.
This supports the idea that STM and LTM are stored and processed differently in the brain.