Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 Memory IIE 9: Cognitive Psychology Greg Francis Humans demonstrate memory when they behave in a way that could only be based upon previous experience Lecture does not necessarily imply that there are memory systems Memory could be a by-product of other Why telephone operators seem rude. systems (vision, audition, language, ) Perception to memory Whole Report Suppose you want to know how much information is available in a single visual Write down as many letters as you see glance How would you measure it? It turns out it s a complicated thing that involves both perception and memory Whole Report Whole Report Write down as many letters as you see Write down as many letters as you see L C X K G B R T V F D J
Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 Whole report results Subjects report.5 letters on average (Sperling, 9) Subjects claim they saw more letters, but lost the percept while they reported they cannot report fast enough How can we tell if percept is lost? Same type of letter matrix Indicate which row to report after the matrix disappears choice of row is random Suppose the subject reports 3 of letters from any row =>3/ths of each row was available ==> entire field was available B R D V K F T X C L G J delay
Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 delay Z X F N I H B E Q L M J delay Results Vary delay to watch decay from memory compare to CogLab data delay Number of letters correct 3... Delay of tone (seconds) Results CogLab data (7 participants) Results But we can test on any row and get essentially the same result so, the number of letters that actually persist and is available is found by multiplying by the number of rows Number of letters available 8... Delay of tone (seconds) 3
Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 Iconic/sensory memory Masking We saw before how attention can modulate masking effects Performance is better than the whole-report procedure because you can focus attention on just one row before percepts fade away Number of letters available 8... Delay of tone (seconds) Masking effects can also influence iconic memory persistence-based memory is very brief, and is easily destroyed Iconic memory is brief easily disturbed with masking with masking H N S R C Q D A P U T B with masking Masking With the mask you do not have enough time to focus attention on the indicated row X X X X X X X X X X X X Iconic memory is so brief (less than a second) that it probably has little to do with normal memory Other systems are more notable
Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 Echoic memory Echoic memory Other senses have a similar type of persistence or sensory memory A S W F H V D E X Properties Longer duration (seconds) Smaller capacity Significant for some memory tasks Number of letters available 5 3 3 Delay (seconds) Immediate serial recall Serial position curve A particular kind of memory task After given a list of items e.g., digits, letters, words, subject must report them back ) no delay (immediate) ) in the correct order (serial) 3) no cues (recall, not recognition) Plot percentage correctly recalled against position of item in list Often, subjects recall first and last items best.8... Primacy 3 5 7 Recency Modality effect Modality effect Recency depends on the modality of presentation.8. Auditory. Visual. 3 5 7 Explanation: In this task, recency depends on sensory memory It takes time to report all the items in the list, in order in the visual presentation, iconic memory of the last item is gone before subject tries to report it (poor recall) in the auditory presentation, echoic memory of last item is still present when subject tries to report it (good recall) Thus, auditory presentation shows recency, but visual does not 5
Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 Suffix effect Suffix effect Auditory presentation, only Cue to report is either a word or a tone Recency when cue to report is a tone Loss of recency when cue to report is a word 8 7 9,,,, 8, 7, 9 Demonstration.8... 3 5 7 Tone Word Suffix effect Phone operators Not affected by practice meaning of cue word common vs. rare word Words are physically different from tones suffix word acts like a mask to wipe out last word in list from echoic memory the situation is similar to being unable to report the letters in the partial report task with the X-masks Call information for a number Operators are very short give the number do not say goodbye or have a nice day Avoiding the suffix effect! you would forget the last part of the phone number if they finished with pleasantries Neat property Other suffix effects Tactile suffix effect Neath et al. (993) suffix was person saying baa or woof subjects told» person s voice» animal sound.8... 3 5 7 animal speech touch locations on hand, recall order suffix = word or rap on knuckles Lip reading no acoustic signal Mouthing words while reading off a screen Echoic memory cannot account for all of these results
Prof. Greg Francis 5/3/8 Conclusions Next time Memory iconic memory (visual) echoic memory (auditory) Two store model short term memory Relation to immediate serial recall (recency) long term memory modality effect suffix effect significance for phone operators Experiments CogLabs on Brown-Peterson and Serial position due! Why it is difficult to win a pizza at Little Ceasers. 7