Chapter 4: Working MemoryChapter Introduction-Research confirms that your memory is limited in both its duration and its capacity when you must remember new info-Your memory is limited, even when the delay is less than 1 minute-Your attention processes limit the amount of info that passes on to your memory-Working memoryoThe brief, immediate memory for the limited amount of material that your are currently processingoPart of working memory also actively coordinates your ongoing mental activitiesoLets you keep a few items active and accessible, so that you can use them for a wide variety of cognitive tasks -Long term memoryoLarge capacity and contains your memory for experiences and info that have accumulated throughout your lifetimeoNo limit to the amount of info in your long term memory-Working mem needs to emphasize the kind of info that is useful to you right now, and it selects this material out of an enormous wealth of info that you possess -Each of the major components of working memory has a limited capacity The Classic Research on Working Memory (Short Term Memory)George Miller's "Magical Number Seven"-Proposed that we can hold only a limited number of items in short term memory-People can remember about seven digits, give or take two -ChunkoA memory unit that consists of several components that are strongly associated with one anotheroSTM holds about 7 chunks-Emphasized that our cog processes are active, we do not focus only on visible stimuli and visible responses Other Early Research on the Capacity of STM-1950s-1970s: two methods to asses how much info STM could holdoBrown/Peterson & Peterson techniqueoSerial position effect The Brown/Peterson & Peterson Technique-Demonstrated that material held in memory for less than one min is frequently forgotten-This technique presented some items that students were instructed to remember; then the students performed a distracting task; and finally they were asked to recall the original items-Our memory is fragile for material stored just for a few seconds The Recency Effect-Serial position effectoRefers to the U shaped relationship between a word's position in the list and its probability of recalloShows a strong recency effect-Better recall for items at the end of the list-This means that items were still in STM at the time of recall-Items did not move onward to a more permanent form of memoryoOne way of measuring size of STM is to count the number of accurately recalled items at the end of the list oSize of STM is estimated to be between 3 and 7 items oAlso shows strong primacy effect-Enhanced recall for items at the beginning of the list-These early items are presumably easy to remember for two reasonsDon’t need to compete with any earlier itemsPeople rehearse these items more frequently People have better recall for items at the beginning and end of a listSemantic Similarity -SemanticsoMeaning of words and sentences-Proactive Interference (PI)oPeople have trouble learning new material because previously learned material keeps interfering with their new learning -Release from proactive interferenceoPerformance on a new category of items almost as high as it had been on the first itemoCould also be obtained when the researchers shifted the semantic category of the items -Semantic factors influence the number of items that we can store in working memory-Words that we have previously stored can interfere with the recall of new words that are similar in meaning-The degree of semantic similarity is related to the amount of interference-The number of items stored in WM depends on both chunking strategies and word meaning Atkinson and Shiffrin's Model-Argued that the items in STM are fragile, and they could be lost within about 30 second unless they are repeated-Control processesoIntentional strategies - such as rehearsal - that people may use to improve their memory The Working Memory Approach-Major function of STM is to hold several interrelated bits of info in our mind, all at the same time, so that a person canwork with this info and then use it appropriately-WM doesn't simply store information but actively works with that info-Working memory approach oProposed by alan baddeleyoOur immediate memory is a multipart system that temporarily holds and manipulates info while we perform cog tasksoDifferent from earlier models because he proposed multiple components for our working memory -Emphasizes that we manipulate info-WM is like a workbench where material is constantly being handled, combined, and transformed-This workbench holds both new material and old material that you have retrieved from storage (Long term memory) Evidence for Components with Independent Capacities-Working memory is not unitaryoParticipants read string of numbers that varied in length from zero to 8 items and simultaneously performed aspatial reasoning task about letter order -People performed remarkably quickly and accurately on both of these two simultaneous tasks-These participants required less than a second longer on the reasoning task when instructed to rehearse all 8 numerals, in contrast to a task that required no rehearsal -This study suggested that people can indeed perform two tasks simultaneously Phonological Loop-Phonological loopoCan process a limited number of sounds for a short period of timeoProcesses language and other sounds that you hear as well as sounds you makeoActive during subvocalization: when you silently pronounce the words you are reading Research on Acoustic Confusions-Acoustic confusionsoPeople are likely to confuse similar sounding stimulioWhen the words sounded different from one another, people recalled more items than when the words sounded similar oPeople confuse acoustically similar sounds with one another when they are rehearsing the items, not when these items are simply stored in the phonological loop Other Uses for the Phonological Loop-Simple counting tasks-Inner voice -Examples how phonological loop plays central role in other cog processesoWM is gateway to long term memoryoUse your PL during self instruction-When you silently remind yourself about something you need to do in the future or how to use somecomplicated equipmentoWhen you learn new words in your first language oWhen you're readingoWhen you produce language and when you're learning a new languageoMathematical calculations and problem solving tasks Neuroscience Research on the Phonological Loop-PL tasks activate part of the frontal lobe and