Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Some Questions to Consider
Short-Term and
ShortWorking Memory
Chapter 5 of Goldstein
 Why can we remember a telephone
number long enough to place a call, but
then we forget it almost immediately?
y to increase the ability
y to
 Is there a way
remember things that have just
happened?
 Do we use the same memory system to
remember things we have seen and heard?
 Is there a relationship between memory
capacity and intelligence?
Sensory Memory, ShortShort-Term
Memory, and Working Memory
Sensory Memory, ShortShort-Term
Memory, and Working Memory
 Sensory Memory
 Short
Short--Term Memory
 Working Memory
 Sensory Memory
Sensory Memory (a.k.a., The
Sensory Register)
Sensory Memory (a.k.a., The
Sensory Register)
 Definition
 Function
 Characteristics
 Size and Duration
 Veridical Representation
 Definition
 Short
Short--Term Memory
 Working Memory




Function
Characteristics
Size and Duration
Veridical Representation
1
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
The Sensory Register
The Sensory Register
 Sensory register is a memory system
 Two types of Sensory register
Brief storage of sensory data
Visual Sensory Register
 Iconic Memory
Auditory Sensory Register
 Echoic Memory
Sensory Memory (a.k.a., The
Sensory Register)
Function of Sensory Register
 Definition
 Why do we have a sensory Register?
 Function
 Characteristics
 Size and Duration
 Veridical
V idi l Representation
R
t ti
Processing takes time
Limited processing capacity
Why do we have a sensory
Register?
Sensory Memory (a.k.a., The
Sensory Register)
 Maintains sensory information until
interpretative processes are free.
 Definition
 Function
 Characteristics
 Size and Duration
 Veridical
V idi l Representation
R
t ti
2
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Sensory Register Characteristics
 3 characteristics
Serve to optimize storage function
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
3 Characteristics of Sensory
Register
 Veridical storage
 Large Capacity
 Brief duration
Rapidly decays
overwritten
Sensory Memory (a.k.a., The
Sensory Register)
The Size and Duration of the
Sensory Register
 Definition
 Function
 Characteristics
 The visual sensory store
 Size and Duration
 Veridical
V idi l Representation
R
t ti
Sperling’s research
 Overcame several methodological
problems
Sperling (1960)
Studied size and duration of visual
sensory store.
Sperling’s (1960) Partial Report
Technique
 Presented array of letters
9 or 12 consonants
How do you ensure only one single view
of stimulus?
 To do this, Sperling used:
• Very brief presentations
 50 msecs
• Report of only portion of data
 Avoids memory loss
H B S T
A H M G
E
L
W C
3
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Sperling’s (1960) Partial Report
Technique
Sperling’s (1960) Partial Report
Technique
 Identify single line
 Also varied when tone appeared
Indicated line to read by tone
ranged from 0 msecs to 1000 msecs
 low tone = bottom row
 middle tone = middle row
 high tone = upper row
Sperling’s (1960) Partial Report
Technique
 Results
Whole Report
From 9 item display, reported
• 4 or 5 letters
P ti l Report
Partial
R
t
9 item display
• Close to 100% accurate
12 items display
• 75% accurate
Caption: Results of Sperling’s (1960) partial report
experiments. The decrease in performance is due to the
rapid decay of iconic memory (sensory memory in the
modal model).
Sperling’s (1960) Partial Report
Technique
Sperling’s (1960) Partial Report
Technique
 Results
 Conclusions
Effects of Delay
 Short delay
• Recall most of items
Ichonic memory exists
 Contains sensory information
 Lasts around 250 - 300 msecs
 Long delay (300 msecs
msecs))
• similar to whole report
4
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Darwin, Turvey, and
Crowder(1972)
Auditory Sensory Store
 Darwin, Turvey,
Turvey, and Crowder (1972)
Required participants to report
information heard in ears
 left ear
 right ear
 both ears (center of head)
Darwin, Turvey, and
Crowder(1972)
Darwin, Turvey, and
Crowder(1972)
 Results
 Results
Data From Darwin, Turve, and Crowder (1972)
Duration as long as 4 seconds
5
 Most vivid within first second
4.9
Mean Items Correct
4.8
4.7
4.6
4.5
4.4
4.3
4.2
0
1
2
3
4
Delay(sec.)
Echoic Memory
Suffix Effect Results
 Other Evidence
Modality Effect
Suffix Effect
5
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Sensory Memory (a.k.a., The
Sensory Register)




Definition
Function
Characteristics
Size and Duration
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Veridical Representation
 Represents information taken in with
senses
pre
pre--categorical
 Veridical Representation
Veridical Representation
Veridical Representation
 Evidence
 von Wright (1968)
von Wright (1968)
 Used Sperling’s Partial report technique
• Numbers and letters
• In some trials, “Report all numbers”
• In other trials, “Report all letters”
Results
 Accuracy similar when reporting letters or
numbers as when using whole report
technique
Reason
 Full processing required to decide if letter or
number
• Categorical processing
Sensory Store
Memory Structures
 Review
 Sensory Memory
Characteristics of Sensory Store
 Veridical storage
g Capacity
p
y
 Large
 Brief duration
 Short
Short--Term Memory
 Working Memory
6
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Short--Term Memory
Short
Short--Term Memory
Short
 Evidence for STM
 Capacity of STM
 The Coding of Information in STM
 Retrieval of Information from STM
 Evidence for STM
Short--Term Memory
Short
 Short term memory is:
Where we first process stimuli originating
in the environment
Tiny in capacity
Brief in duration
Short--Term Memory
Short
 Evidence for the existence of STM
Neurocognition
 Milner (1968)
 Capacity of STM
 The Coding of Information in STM
 Retrieval of Information from STM
Short--Term Memory
Short
 Evidence for the existence of STM
The recency effect
Neurocognitive Evidence for
Existence of STM
 Milner (1968)
Studied memory of H.M.
 H.M. had portion of brain removed to combat
severe epilepsy
• removed part of hippocampus and temporal lobe
 No long term memory
 Intact short term memory
 Intact procedural learning
7
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Short--Term Memory
Short
Short--Term Memory
Short
 Evidence for STM
 Brown (1958)/Peterson & Peterson
(1959) task
 Capacity of STM
 The Coding of Information in STM
 Retrieval of Information from STM
Short--Term Memory
Short
Demonstrated the limited capacity of STM
Peterson & Peterson (1959)
 Brown (1958)/Peterson & Peterson
(1959) task
subject required to remember consonant
trigrams
 e.g. HLM
Also given number
 e.g. 492
required to subtract 3 from number until
asked to recall
 e.g. 492, 489, 486,….
Short--Term Memory
Short
Capacity of STM
 Brown(1958)/Peterson & Peterson
(1959) task
 Miller (1956)
Results
 items not rehearsed dropped quickly from
memory
capacity of 7 +/+/- 2 items can be held in
STM
 STM and Chunking
capacity can be increased by chunking
information
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Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Capacity of STM
Short--Term Memory
Short
 STM, LTM, and Chunking
 Evidence for STM
 Capacity of STM
Chunking cannot occur until some
information in LTM is activated
 The Coding of Information in STM
 Retrieval of Information from STM
Semantic coding in STM
Release from PI
 Proactive Interference
 Wickens, Dalezman, & Eggemeier,
(1976)
Earlier presentation interferes with
 Recall of later items
g y
 When from same category
required participants to memorize words
in a Peterson task
 1st three trials = fruit names
 4th trial from another category
•
•
•
•
Wickens, Dalezman, &
Eggemeier, (1976)
vegetables
flowers
professions
etc.
Coding of Information in STM
 Auditory Code (Phonological Loop)
Information in STM appears to be in an
auditory code
Conrad (1964)
 Required participants to remember lists of
consonants
• Some sounded the same
 E.g. C and V, M and N etc
• Some sounded different
 E.g., G and V, M and T
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Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Coding of Information in STM
Coding of Information in STM
 Auditory Code (Phonological Loop)
 Visual coding – Della Sala (1999)
Conrad (1964)
 Results
• Errors were phonologically based
 Even with visual presenation
Presented visual information that is
difficult to verbalize
Participants could recreate patterns
of up to 9 items
STM is also visual
Short--Term Memory
Short




Evidence for STM
Neurocognition and STM
Capacity of STM
The Coding of Information in STM
Retrieval of Information from
STM
 Sternberg (1966) Paradigm
 Retrieval of Information from STM
Sternberg Possible Results
 Parallel
Search
Sternberg Possible Results
 Serial Self
Self-terminating
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Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Sternberg Possible Results
 Serial
Exhaustive
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Sternberg Paradigm
 Results
Sternberg Paradigm
Sternberg Search
 Results
 Always Serial Exhaustive?
Subjects conducted serial exhaustive
search
 Time for search
• 38 milliseconds per item
 DeRosa & Tkacz (1976)
 Presented pictures telling a story
• E.g., diver or golfer
 Presented in 2 ways
• Randomly
• In sequence
Sternberg Search
Memory: Models and Methods
 Always Serial Exhaustive?
 Sensory Memory
 Short
Short--Term Memory
 DeRosa & Tkacz (1976)
 Results
 Working Memory
• Random ordering
 Serial exhaustive search
• Ordered sequence
 Parallel processing
11
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Working Memory
Working Memory
 Baddeley’s research showed that
STM cannot be a unitary system
 Baddeley (1986)
e.g. Baddeley (1986)
 Subject required to remember number
sequences
• 0 to 8 digits in length
Baddeley (1986)
At same time, completed reasoning task
 verified a series of sentences describing order
of two letters
• e.g. A follows B-B--BA
BA (true)
 Sentence varied in Complexity
 Measured time to verify sentences
Baddeley (1986)
 Conclusions
STM cannot be single unitary store
Must have both Working memory and
STM
The Working Memory model
Baddeley’s Working Memory
model
 Baddeley & Hitch (1974)
3 systems in working memory
 A primary attentional system
y
 Two slave systems
• Phonological Loop
• Visual Spatial Sketchpad
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Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Baddeley’s Working Memory
model
Evidence for the phonological
loop
 The phonological Loop
 The phonological similarity effect
Comprised of two components
 Phonological store
Immediate serial recall impaired when
items sound similar
 Articulatory control process
Evidence for the phonological
loop
Salamé & Baddeley (1982)
 The unattended speech effect
Immediate serial recall impaired by
unattended speech
Salamé & Baddeley (1982)
(1982)–
– Experiment 1
 Presented list of digits visually
 Subjects required to ignore background
speech
• English words
• nonsense syllables
Salamé & Baddeley (1982)
Salamé & Baddeley (1982)
 Experiment 2
Again, serially presented digits
3 distraction conditions
 Words
 Noise bursts
 Silence
13
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Evidence for the phonological
loop
Evidence for the phonological
loop
 The wordword-length effect
 Articulation rate
duration of spoken words determines size
of memory span
Ellis & Hennelly (1980)
 Memory span of bilingual Welsh children
 Tested in Welsh and English
Naveh
Naveh--Benjamin & Ayres (1986)
 Tested memory span in different languages
• English (short syllables)
• Spanish & Hebrew (longer syllables)
• Arabic (longest syllables)
• Poorer memory spans in Welsh than in English
Naveh--Benjamin & Ayres (1986)
Naveh
The Visual Spatial Sketchpad
 2nd major slave system of Baddeley’s
working memory theory
The Visual Spatial Sketchpad
Posner & Keele (1967)
 Posner & Keele (1967)
Presented a letter
Presented a 2nd letter
Participants required to indicate if letter
same or different
14
Psyc 3705--Sensory Mem, STM and
Working Mem
Posner & Keele (1967)
Nov. 15 and 22, 2013
Memory Structures
 Summary
Memory begins with a brief sensory store
 Sensory store has certain characteristics
Memory lasts longer and becomes more
concrete with time
Increased RT as Interval Increases
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