Memory Revision

Memory revision booklet

Strategies for improving memory - Mnemonics

Mnemonics are techniques developed to aid memory.  According to Craik and Lockhart's level of processing model, mnemonics work because you are putting effort into your learning, organising information in a distinctive way.  this encourages deep processing, which in turn leads to long lasting, enduring memories.

Look at the following website for examples of verbal mnemonics:
verbal mnemonics


Look at the following websites for examples of visual mnemonics:
Loci
Key word method

Remember - 

• Visual mnemonics are apparently better than verbal mnemonics due to dual-processing 
• Mnemonics may not be suitable to everyone (learning styles and disabilities may have an impact on the success of the mnemonic used)

The Cognitive Interview (CI)

Information taken from:  

http://fds.oup.com/www.oup.com/pdf/13/9781850085492.pdf

Thank you!

Eyewitness Testimony (EWT)

Research into eyewitness testimonies has proven that there are many factors that can have a negative impact on the accuracy and reliability of such reports.  

The role of Anxiety and EWT

Read through the information of the following website:

http://www.simplypsychology.org/eyewitness-testimony.html

Answer the following questions to help you extend your knowledge and critical understanding of the topics covered in class - 

1.  What did Clifford and Scott find when studying the link between anxiety and recall?  How does it link to the Yerkes-Dodson law?

2.  What were the full details of Yuielle and Cutshall's real life research?  What does this suggest about anxiety and memory?

3.  Explain a criticism of Yuielle and Cutshall's real life research

Additional real life research into the role of anxiety and EWT was conducted by Christianson and Hubinette's.  Follow this link to read more about this study:

Christianson and Hubinette research

Misleading information and EWT

Key research:

Loftus' research has been criticised for lacking ecological validity (e.g. you cannot generalise the findings to other settings).  this has been confirmed by research into misleading questions in real life, such as Yuielle and Cutshall's research seen earlier.

 

Encoding, Capacity and Duration

Encoding = The way information is changed so that it can be stored.

Example:  When you smell a blow off, you automatically think 'errrr, someone has done a blow off!'.  you have automatically recoded a smell into an acoustic code, allowing it to pass on to the short-term memory store!

Capacity = How much information can be stored

Duration = The length of time information can be stored

	Sensory Memory	Short Term Memory	Long Term Memory
Encoding	Information is stored in its raw form.  Information floods the senses and enters the sensory store associated with each individual sense: For example: Iconic – Visual Echoic – Sound Haptic - Touch	Baddeley (1966) * Mostly Acoustic (through sounds) Additional research also points to visual encoding	Baddeley (1966) * Mostly Semantic (through meaning) Additional research shows other encoding methods are used, depending on what is being attended to.  e.g. Visual encoding is used when storing faces
Capacity	Iconic is much larger than Echoic	Jacobs (1987) * Digit Span Technique 7 +/- 2 units of information ‘Chunking’ increases capacity	Unlimited – cues required for retrieval
Duration	Echoic – lasts up to 2 seconds Iconic – Lasts a mere 0.5 seconds	Peterson & Peterson (1959) 18 seconds, if rehearsal is prevented.	Bahrick (1975) * Year book study 90% recall of information from information stored over 48 years ago. A very long time – but cues are required to aid retrieval.

* Research can be found at:

http://www.simplypsychology.org/Short%20and%20Long%20Term%20Memory.pdf