What is the capacity of the LTM?
Potentially unlimited
Who investigated the duration of the LTM?
Bahrick et al
Describe Bahrick’s experiment
- Bahrick studied 392 participants from an US University aged between 17 and 74.
- Using the participants high school yearbooks, recall was tested
- Firstly by: photo-recognition (can the participants name the person in the photo?)
- Secondly by: free recall (participants have to recall all the names in their class)
What were the results?
- Participants who had left high school 15 years ago could name 90% of the photos. Free recall
was 60% accurate. - Participants who had left high school 48 years ago could name 70% of the photos. Free recall
was 30% accurate.
What is the duration of the LTM?
Very long, up to a lifetime
Evaluate Bahrick’s study
Pros:
- Sample = very representative
- High mundane realism
- High external validity
Cons:
- Low internal validity
Who investigated how the LTM codes?
Badderley (1966)
Describe Badderley’s study
Gave different lists of words to four groups of participants to remember.
- A list of words that were either ACOUSTICALLY similar (sound the same, e.g. hat, cat, mat etc. )
- A list of words that were ACOUSTICALLLY dissimilar (dog, tap, try).
- A list of words that were either SEMANTICALLY similar (mean the same thing e.g. tall, high big).
- A list of words that were SEMANTICALLY dissimilar (late safe foul).
How does the LTM code?
When testing for LTM (asking PP’s to recall the lists in order after 20 minutes), they struggled with semantically similar list. The similarity causes confusion as the words interfere with each other – This is because the LTM codes SEMANTICALLY
What are the three different types of LTM?
Episodic Memory, Procedural Memory and Semantic Memory
What is Episodic Memory?
- A type of LTM that involves remembering specific events and experiences, and when/where they occurred.
- Has to be recalled deliberately with conscious effort
- It is less resistant to forgetting
What is Procedural Memory?
- A type of LTM that involves remembering specific actions and skills - often called muscle memory
- Can be recalled without conscious effort
- The most resistant to forgetting
What is Semantic Memory?
- A type of LTM that involves remembering general knowledge, concepts and facts
- Has to be recalled deliberately with conscious effort
- Not tied to specific personal experience
Who is Clive Wearing and what is so remarkable about him?
The man with the worst short-term memory loss in the world - he forgets things after around 7 seconds. However, he used to be a pianist and can still play piano very well and compose music.
What is a strength of Clive Wearing as a study?
He shows evidence for the long term memory having different stores - he can still play piano perfectly (procedural memory), can remember what O-Levels are (semantic memory) but can’t remember what his wife has just told him (episodic memory).
What is a weakness of Clive Wearing as a case study?
- Case studies lack control of variables
- We do not know what Wearing’s STM was like before he became ill
- We can’t judge cause and effect and internal validity is limited
What is a practical application used to evaluate the LTM stores?
- A strength
- Bellville et al (2006)
- Created an intervention to improve episodic memory in older people
- Trained participants performed better on an episodic memory test compared to the untrained control group
