Notes

Multi store model of memory

The multi store model made by Atkinson and Shiffrin made in 1968 brought about ideas to explain the processes and workings of the human memory and provided complex explanation as to how these worked.

The multi store model mainly consisted of three parts. The sensory register, short term memory, and long term memory. The sensory register deals with all the different senses going through the body in fractions of seconds. The sensory register is therefore complex with cells in each sense to deal with this information. The two main senses the sensory register deals with are the iconic memory which is visual and echoic memory which is sound The short term memory is linked to the sensory register directly with most information going through the sensory register also going into the short term memory. If attention is given to the sensory memory, 5 to 9 items are available to be put in the short term memory for up to 18 to 30 seconds. The short term memory mostly holds acoustic memory, if rehearsed enough and or important enough, the multi store model explains that information can go from the short term memory to the long term memory or straight to the long term memory from the sensory memory if important enough the long term memory’s coding is mainly semantic and its capacity is unlimited in this model

The multi store model has proved evidence to show its explanations are correct for example, Badley showed that we mix up words that sound similar when using our short term memory and we mix up words that have similar meaning when using our long term memory's. This shows that our short term memory is acoustic and our long term memory is semantic, having real evidence to support this theory very important because it rules out any other theories unless they support this evidence as well, providing a smaller margin of competition for the correct theory of memory meaning the multi store model is more likely to be correct.


The multi store model, despite its complexity also has has flaws. First of all, the multi store model states that there is only one type of short term memory, however, evidence shows that this s wrong, and in fact impossible, Shallice and Warrington in 1970 studied a patient known as KF with severe amnesia. They were able to show that KF's short term memory was better with digits when he read them himself rather then being read to him by another person. The unitary short term memory in the multi store model is therefore a limitation because it shows there must be at least one short term memory to process visual information and another short term memory to process auditory information.

Overall, the multi store model has a complex and thought through model however evidence proves that tits theories cannot be used and in some cases are impossible, therefore it is hard to use this theory in the real world and use it to explain memory today.