A measure of short-term memory. It is the number of digits someone can remember

digit span

A measure of short-term memory that measures how much information someone can retain from a briefly displayed stimuli (often simpler stimuli than other methods). Participants are asked whether a change occurred after a brief delay from the original stimuli.

Change detection

Based on a 1956 review of memory research, psychologist George Miller concluded that the capacity of short-term memory is limited to approximately seven items, plus or minus two. This range, from 5 to 9 items, is often referred to as the 'magic number' in psychology.

The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two

The retention of information in short-term memory is influenced by two factors: memory trace decay and interference.

Factors Affecting Short-Term Memory Retention

A friend quickly recites a list of 12 grocery items for you to remember. Without writing them down, you walk to the store. A minute later, you find you can only recall about 6 or 7 of the items. Which of the following best explains this common memory failure?

The retention of a small amount of information for a brief period of time. It can hold information for 15-20 seconds and can hold 5-7 items.

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Google

- Short-term Memory
- Long-term Memory
- Affective System
- Motor System
- Sensory memory
- Working memory
- Recognition memory

Memory Systems of Brain ("Structural features")

Goldstein, E. B. (2014). Cognitive psychology: Connecting mind, research and everyday experience. Nelson Education.


Cognitive psychology: Connecting mind, research and everyday experience

Spielman, R. M., Jenkins, W. J., & Lovett, M. D. (2020, April 22). Psychology (2nd ed.). OpenStax. https://openstax.org/books/psychology-2e/pages/1-introduction

OpenStax Psychology (2nd ed.) Textbook

Short-term memory (STM)

Can hold a lot of information for years (even decades). Sometimes described as an archive of information.

Long-term memory (LTM) 

The retention of sensory information for a very brief period of time. An initial stage of memory that holds information for seconds or fractions of seconds.

Sensory memory

Working memory is a cognitive system with a limited capacity that can hold information temporarily. Working memory is important for reasoning, learning and comprehension. Some of the manipulation of information takes place in working memory

Working Memory

Identifying some kind of stimuli that was previously present.

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