A MODEL OF WORKING MEMORY

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A MODEL OF WORKING MEMORY

• BADDELEY AND HITCH

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BRADDELEY AND HITCH A MODEL OF A WORKING MEMORY

• ALAN BADDELEY AND GRAHAM HITCH (1974)
• Suggests that memory is an active,
  multi-component memory system.
• Subsystems of working memory with temporarily
  stores and manipulates information.
• Working memory encodes the information into long
  term memory (LTM) and retrieves the memory from
  LTM
• Indicates we are actively doing something with
  the information. e.g memory holds words before we
  form a sentence.
• Holds all information for cognitive activities.
  (planning, thinking, analysis)

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BRADDELEY AND HITCH WORKING MEMORY

• Originally suggested that working memory
  consisted of three separate components that did
  not relate to each other.
• Called slave systems
• Phonological loop
• Visuospatial sketchpad
• Central executive
• 2000, Braddeley added a third slave system the
  episodic buffer.

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What the model looks like
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THE PHONOLOGICAL LOOP OUR INNER VOICE AND EAR

• Phonological loop holds verbal information
• Is an area of working memory that stores a
  limited number of speech based and acoustic
  sounds that are received from echoic memory
  (Atkinson and Shiffrin) and/or LTM
• Will hold for up to 2 seconds unless information
  is rehearsed to prevent decay of memory.
• Is at work when preparing a sentence, or
  temporarily remembering a phone number.
• Has two subsystems
• Phonological store inner ear
• Articulatory control system inner voice

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THE PHONOLOGICAL LOOP PHONOLOGICAL STORE
ARTICULATORY CONTROL SYSTEM

• Phonological loop stores sounds we hear for 1.5 -
  2 seconds. These sounds will fade unless taken by
  the articulatory control system.
• The articulatory control system holds sound we
  want to keep, or that we are preparing to speak.
  Will hold for 2 seconds.

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VISUOSPATIAL SKETCHPAD (INNER EYE)

• The visuospatial sketchpad (VS) is one of two
  passive slave systems in Baddeley Hitchs
  (1986) model of working memory
• Visual information refers to what things appear
  to look like.
• The VS provides temporary storage and
  manipulation of visual and spatial information
  held in the long-term memory (LTM).

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• The information stored is maintained by spatial
  rehearsal
• The VS plays an important role in helping us keep
  track of where we are in relation to other
  objects as we move through our environment.
• Evidence suggests that working memory uses two
  different systems for dealing with visual and
  verbal information.

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• A visual processing task and a verbal processing
  task can be performed at the same time. It is
  more difficult to perform two visual tasks at the
  same time because they interfere with each other
  and performance is reduced.
• The same applies to performing two verbal tasks
  at the same time. This supports the view that the
  phonological loop and the sketchpad are separate
  systems within working memory.

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• As we move around, our position in relation to
  objects is constantly changing and it is
  important that we can update this information. 
• E.g., being aware of where we are in relation to
  desks, chairs and tables when we are walking
  around a classroom means that we don't bump into
  things too often!

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EPISODIC BUFFER

• Briefly stores limited amounts of information
  from the phonological loop and visuospatial
  sketchpad with information taken from LTM.
• The information taken from the two is integrated
  into an episode to make sense.

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CENTRAL EXECUTIVE CONTROLLING ACTIVITY

• Central executive monitors, coordinates and
  integrates information from the phonological
  loop, visuospatial and episodic buffer.
• It controls
• The flow of information from its slave systems
  which plays a major role in attention
• Which items move in and out of short term memory
  (STM) by deciding which information arriving from
  sensory will be attended to
• The retrieval process from long term memory (LTM)
• When we multi-task

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• Two key characteristics of Atkinson and
  Shriffins multi-store model that originally
  defined STM limited capacity and limited
  duration are present in the working memory
  model.
• But the Baddeley and Hitch model accounts for
  evidence that STM handles a greater variety of
  functions and depends on more complicated
  processes than previously thought.

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THE END ?