Memory | Edexcel GCSE Psychology (1PS0)

Memory

81 questions
5 subtopics
Paper 1
Paper 1

Memory is examined in Paper 1, every student.

It covers information processing, duration and capacity, retrograde and anterograde amnesia, Bartlett's theory of reconstructive memory, the multi-store model, reductionism and holism and War of the Ghosts and the Peterson and Peterson study.

Sample questions from Memory

Answer each one closed book first, then open the answer.

Information processing, duration and capacity

Define storage in memory.

Show the answer
Storage is holding information in the memory system over time.
Information processing, duration and capacity

What is the capacity of short-term memory?

Show the answer
Short-term memory can hold about 7 ± 2 items at once.
Retrograde and anterograde amnesia

Why are older memories often better preserved than recent ones in retrograde amnesia?

Show the answer
Older memories have been stored in long-term memory for longer and are well consolidated. Recent memories may not have been fully consolidated when the damage occurred.
Retrograde and anterograde amnesia

What caused Clive Wearing's amnesia?

Show the answer
A viral infection of the brain, herpes encephalitis, damaged Clive Wearing's brain in 1985.
Bartlett's theory of reconstructive memory

Give an example of a schema for a familiar event.

Show the answer
A restaurant schema includes being seated, ordering from a menu, eating and paying the bill.
Bartlett's theory of reconstructive memory

A witness remembers a robber holding a gun though none was present. How does reconstructive memory explain the error?

Show the answer
The witness's schema for robberies includes a weapon. The schema filled a gap in memory with an expected detail.
The multi-store model, reductionism and holism

How does the multi-store model describe long-term memory?

Show the answer
The multi-store model describes long-term memory as a separate store that can hold information permanently. The model assumes that its capacity has no limit.
The multi-store model, reductionism and holism

What is holism?

Show the answer
Holism is the view that behaviour should be studied as a whole. The whole is more than the sum of its parts.

The 5 subtopics

One subtopic is one session. Work down the list.

Subtopic	What it covers	Questions
Information processing, duration and capacity	Input, processing and output, encoding, storage and retrieval, and the capacity and duration of short-term and long-term memory.	16
Retrograde and anterograde amnesia	The symptoms and causes of retrograde and anterograde amnesia, why older memories survive, and the cases of HM and Clive Wearing.	15
Bartlett's theory of reconstructive memory	Reproductive and reconstructive memory, schemas, effort after meaning, rationalisation, omission and confabulation, and the theory's strengths and limits.	14
The multi-store model, reductionism and holism	Atkinson and Shiffrin's sensory register, short-term and long-term stores, attention and rehearsal, the evidence from amnesia and serial position, and reductionist and holistic explanations.	18
War of the Ghosts and the Peterson and Peterson study	Bartlett's repeated and serial reproduction of the War of the Ghosts, and Peterson and Peterson's counting-backwards study of forgetting from short-term memory.	18

Memory is 81 of the 891 questions in the guide.Get the guide, £7

How the guide is worked

Answering a question from memory stores it far better than reading the answer again. The guide runs that as a fixed procedure on one subtopic at a time, about twenty minutes a session.

Step 1 · Closed book
Cover the answers. Work through one subtopic and write down what you can. Leave blanks where you have nothing.
Step 2 · Open book
Go back to the top. Read each printed answer and write it out in full, including the ones you had right.
Step 3 · Closed book again
Same questions, same order, from memory. The gap between pass one and pass three is the session result.

Read the full method, the return schedule and the research behind it.