MODELS OF

MEMORY
JAVERIA NASIR
 Dualistic Model of Memory

Models of Multi-Store Model of Memory

Memory
Level of Processing

Self-Reference Effect
DUALISTIC MODEL
OF MEMORY
William James + Waugh & Norman
William James
◦ James stated that memory was dichotomous in nature

◦ Memory is dualistic in character: TRANSITORY & PERMANENT

◦ Some things are perceived and enter memory and then are lost. While other things stay in memory
forever

◦ This was the model in which the concept of short-term memory was born
 Primary Memory

• Its similar to STM and has limited capacity

• Its immediate memory
• Its Transitory, never leaves the consciousness
Waugh & •
•
Used for events that have just been Perceived.
Forgetting occurs due to Interference

Norman
(1965) Secondary Memory

• Its similar to LTM and has a large capacity

• Its indirect memory
• Its permanent
• Conceptualized as paths, etched into the brain tissue
of people but with wide individual differences
They created a model in which an item enters primary memory and then may be held
there by rehearsal or may be forgotten.

With rehearsal, the items enters secondary memory and becomes part of the
permanent memory

Enters Enters
Stimulus is Its
Primary Secondary
Perceived rehearsed
Memory Memory
Primacy Recency
Effect Effect

Information that is Information received last

received first or initially or towards the end stays
stays longer longer in memory

Comes into effect when

Comes into effect when
earlier information was
information stays in
bumped out or removed
memory for longer
by new incoming
because it was rehearsed.
information.
MULTI-STORE
MODEL OF
MEMORY
Atkinson and Shiffrin
 Sensory Memory STM LTM

• Transfers to STM • Transfers to LTM • Forgetting occurs

when you pay through rehearsal due to Decay and
attention to it. Interference
• Forgetting occurs
• Forgetting occurs due to Interference
due to Inattention or or no rehearsal
Ignoring
Scenario of forgetting….
You are driving When you saw the street, the Sensory Register
advertisement, the models, the picture
down the street and Forgotten if you did not pay enough
of the food, the information was going
see many billboards into your
attention to, or ignored, the billboards.

One of them is When you decided to ignore all other Short-Term Store
about a new deal at billboards and focus on the Fast Food Forgotten due to interference from (e.g.,
a Fast Food one, the information is now going into other billboards, act of driving itself). Or no
rehearsal (info from billboard ad is not
Restaurant actively rehearsed/repeated)

When you decided to remember the

You want to let details, read the billboard a few items, Long-Term Store
everyone at home and plan to recall it later, the
Forgotten over time or due to interference
know information is going into
or decay
◦ Interference Theory refers to the view that forgetting occurs because recall of certain words
interferes with recall of other words.

Retroactive Proactive
interference (or interference (or
retroactive proactive
inhibition) inhibition)
occurs when occurs when
newly acquired material that was
knowledge learned in the
impedes the past impedes the
recall of older learning of new
material material.
◦ Decay theory asserts that information is forgotten because of the gradual disappearance, rather
than displacement, of the memory trace.

◦ Thus, decay theory views the original piece of the original piece of information as gradually
disappearing unless something is done to keep it intact.
 LEVELS OF
PROCESSING
Craik and lockhart
◦ Craik and Lockhart's (1972) concept of their levels of processing theory (LOP) is based on an
individual's attention and perceptual processes taking place when absorbing data and that the
more deeply an individual processes information, the better they will remember it.
◦ LOP states that there’s various levels of processing and that individuals analyze information
by processing them at different levels; starting from Shallow and then moving on to deeper
levels.
◦ In which deeper analysis gives better memory.

Type of analyses depends on:

◦ Nature of Stimuli
◦ Time available for processing
• Structural Processing:
Thinking about the physical appearance of words to be learnt

• Phonetic Processing:
Thinking about the sound of words to be learnt.

• Semantic Processing:
Thinking about the meaning of the words to be learnt
 This does not mean that information is processed at shallow level first. It can be processed
directly at a deeper level.

Shallow Processing Deep Processing

Involves superficial properties of a stimulus.

Related to an items meaning or its function.
When information is subjected to sensory or
Greater degree of semantic or cognitive analysis
feature analyses

Looking at the physical or overt characteristics of

May trigger past experiences, associations
information

Example: Proofreading Example: Reading for comprehension

Craik and Lockhart (1972) believed that individuals performed two separate
rehearsal strategies;

 Maintenance rehearsal is the process which is said to store verbal

information into STM and is described as information that is being continually
repeated.

 Elaborative rehearsal is a deeper semantic process that relates new

information with existing information within LTM
Structural Model Information Processing

Boxes in the head theory Suggest operations applied to information

Separate structures in the mind Shallow and deep processing

Waugh & Norman; Atkinson & Shiffrin Craik & Lockhart

Criticized for being too common sense,

Criticized for being old and out-dated models
difficult to test, and circular reasoning
 Differences in conceptualization of
Rehearsal
Structural Models Information Processing

• Rehearsal is the means by • Maintaining information at

which information is one level of analysis
transferred from STM to • Or elaborating information by
LTM processing it to deeper level
SELF-REFERENCE
EFFECT
Rogers, Kuiper & Kirker
The tendency to remember words or information better because it is
relevant to you

You are engaging in a powerful self-schema (Me, Myself, I)

Deeply invested in ourselves and so we have a rich and elaborate

network available for storing self-information
 EPISODIC AND
SEMANTIC MEMORY
Tulving