hey everyone welcome back to bearit in mind here's badley and hitch these two psychologists want us to understand how our memory Works ironically though this might be the most complicated thing you ever hear and will certainly tax the limits of your own memory in Psychology there are different models that explore how memory Works models are a representation of how mental processes work this video is part of a series exploring memory and previously we've explored the multistar model and we saw that one of the problems with that model was that its view of short to memory was just too simple the multi star model proposed that short to memory was a single store however other research demonstrated that there are other components to short-term memory so in this video we're going to consider a model that tries to explore that very idea the working memory model work memory is another name for shortterm memory it refers to the part of memory that we're using when we're working on a complex task which requires you to store information as you go along the working memory model goes further than the multistar model by stating that short-term memory not only stores information but also processes it it's storage plus manipulating it and we know from previous videos that shortterm memory or working memory has a limited capacity it can only hold so much information before it gets overloaded the working memory model has four components to it which we're going to explore in turn firstly there is the phonological loop this component of working memory is responsible for processing sound based information research suggests that there are two subcomponents of the phological Loop Number One the articulatory Control process this component is also known as the inner voice because it rehearses verbal sounds why don't they just call it that then rather than that F this helps us to prepare speech and to think in words for example when you sit down with your copy of Harry Potter and the philosopher stone this is the part of your working memory that is producing the speech in your mind when you are reading and maybe sometimes you even hear Steven Fry's voice in your head secondly is the phonological store this is known as the inner ear because it receives and stores sounds its focus is on speech perception if we keep rehearsing The Sounds in our head we can keep it in the phological store blue flower red NOS blue flower red NOS blue flower red NOS this would be so much easier if I wasn't color blind so here's a trap that people like me as a teacher fall into all the time in the classroom I might explain or describe an idea that my students need to write down in their notes but then whilst they're writing it down what we do is teach teers is continue talking and elaborating on what we've said or rewarding it in another way and we teachers we just can't help ourselves but actually at that moment in time our students are using their phonological Loop to its Max to remember and write down what I said and so cannot possibly pay attention and remember all the extra stuff that I'm saying the best thing I as a teacher can do after I explain or describe an idea is shut up which is harder than you might think so firstly the phological loop working memory for sounds has got two parts to it the inner voice which rehearses sound information and the inner ear that stores sound information the next component is the visual spatial sketchpad this is known as your inner eye this is responsible for visual information what we see what an object might look like you see the object in your mind's eye back to our Harry Potter novel you're up to the scene where it describes the derley he was a big beefy man with hardly any neck though he did have a very large mustache now you can picture it in your mind's eye right unless you've got something called a Fantasia but more on that in another video and not only that but spatial information relates to the location of those objects in in a space it helps us to know where things are in relation to one another so for example if your psychology class had ended and you had biology next you would be able to visualize and see spatially in your mind's eye how to move from the psychology classroom to your biology class in a completely different room this is also a handy skill when it's completely dark in the middle of the night and you need to knit to the L without banging into things now as a teacher what I can do to help my students understand understanding is to combine Visual and phological information together if I'm explaining something to you that's quite complex using an image that is related to what I am saying can help your understanding because it makes use of visual and phonological parts of your working memory for example you can see that I've been doing that very thing in this video with the working memory model if I just gave you the text description of the model which would look something like this and talked about it to you that's harder to understand than combining Visual and phological information like this what you could practically do as a student is create a diagram or image that helps capture the main ideas and features of whatever you're reading or hearing being explained this is known as dual coding if you're interested in learning more about dual coding I'll put some links in the descript description below the video for you thirdly we come to the central executive this is thought to be the most important component because it's in control of the phological loop and the visual spatial sketch pad who are you let's just say I'm the boss badley borrowed the word executive from the business world where the executive of a company is the one in charge they manage and control all the other parts of the company and in the same way the central executive in our working memory controls the phological loop and the visual special sketchpad in fact they are referred to as slave systems as they are under the control of the central executive who your dad again you uhhuh the central executive decides what we pay attention to and whether the phological loop or the visual spatial sketch pad does the working this is often seen when our limited working memory is being overloaded with lots of information and so it must decide which part of working memory to prioritize for example imagine you're enjoying your Harry Potter book and we're in the middle of the Sorting Hat scene when your sister comes into the room and turns the TV on your central executive needs to decide what to pay attention to will it turn its attention to what is being said on the TV and tune into that voice or will it Focus its attention on who is going to be placed in griffindor you can also see the central executive at work not only in what it decides to pay attention to but also in what it decides to ignore and not pay attention to now lastly in the year 200000 badley updated the working memory model after a number of studies found results the model couldn't explain for example there was no consideration of how long-term memories may be brought into our working memory and there was nothing nothing included about how sound and visual information could be integrated so another component was added called the episodic buffer another fancy academic term the episodic buffer is thought to act as a backup store the episodic buffer integrates information from all the components of working memory as well as from long-term memory the episodic buffer is not limited or focused to one type of encoding it can store and process both VIs ual and verbal short-term memories for example you're now up to the part in Harry Potter where they are playing quiddit for the first time and so your episodic buffer recalls from your long-term memory what a broom looks like and then creates a visual image of someone flying around on a broom chasing after a golden snitch you then might be able to explore that memory visually in terms of what things look like and move around spatially in that memory it's the episodic Buffet that is thought to temporarily hold all this information and integrate it so that you can use it in your shortterm memory so now let's see how well you've understood the components of the working memory model I'd like to think about your home and count up all the windows pause the video now and add them up can you explain how each of the components of the working merry model we use to complete that task it's worth having a pause of the video now to see if you can figure f it out let's start with the episodic buffer you firstly needed to recall from your long-term memory your own home so that it could be temporarily stored and manipulated in your working memory this shows the episodic buffer linking long-term memory with working memory it also allowed you to temporarily hold all this information and integrate it so that you can use it in your working memory next we can then see the visual spatial sketch PCT work in that you used your inner eye to see your home and where each of the windows are then you use the phonological loop to count the windows you use the articulatory Control process the inner voice to count the numbers in your head and you used your phological store the inner ear to keep count of where you were up to so what about the central executive well this component managed and controlled the phonological loop and the visual spatial sketchpad it allocated the appropriate amount of resources to both Visual and verbal tasks including the amount of attention you gave it notice how much your attention was given up to the task you might not have noticed much else that was going on whilst you did it that was the working memory model were you able to hold all those technical terms in your head I guess after all that information you probably don't have room to explore the research evidence behind working memory and to evaluate it well don't worry I've put that in a separate video which you can watch by clicking on the screen now I hope you found this video helpful and we'll see you in the next one