Coding, Capacity, Duration

Question 1

Who researched coding in STM and LTM?

Answer 1

Baddeley (1966) studied acoustic and semantic coding.

Question 2

What were the key findings on coding?

Answer 2

STM coded acoustically. LTM coded semantically.

Question 3

Who researched capacity of STM and how?

Answer 3

Jacobs (1887) used digit span technique.

Question 4

What is the average digit span according to Miller?

Answer 4

Miller (1956) found STM capacity is 7 ± 2 items.

Question 5

Who challenged Miller’s conclusion and how?

Answer 5

Cowan (2001) argued it’s closer to 4 chunks—Miller overestimated.

Question 6

Who studied duration of STM?

Answer 6

Peterson and Peterson (1959) used trigrams with intervals.

Question 7

What did they find?

Answer 7

STM duration was up to 18–30 seconds without rehearsal.

Question 8

Who studied duration of LTM?

Answer 8

Bahrick et al. (1975) tested recall of high school classmates after decades.

Question 9

What were their key findings?

Answer 9

60% accuracy after 15 years. 30% after 48 years using free recall.

Question 10

AO3 - What are limitations in researching memory structure?

Answer 10

(A) Lab studies may lack realism.
(B) Trigrams aren’t meaningful material. (C)Lack of motivation may reduce validity.

Question 11

AO3 - Why is ecological validity an issue in this research?

Answer 11

(A) Bahrick’s study had high external validity.
(B) Real-life memories were used.
(C) But confounding variables like rehearsal can’t be controlled.

Question 12

AO3 - What are the strengths of these studies?

Answer 12

(A) High control in STM studies = replicability.
(B) Practical application to
exams and revision. (C) Identifies clear functional differences.