The present study examines the effects of short-term memory forgetting under the delay of a distracting task. Eleven subjects were asked to remember three consonants while counting backwards by 3's for varying amounts of time (3-, 9-, 18-sec). An Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to analyze the data and post hocks were done to measure the differences between the levels. The results showed that the retention of the consonants depended on the retention interval, with good performance over short intervals and poor performance after intervals that just 18-sec. in duration. The implications of these findings are discussed.We encounter a great deal of new information in our daily lives. The particular way in which we think about new information affect the ease with which we learn it and the likelihood we can remember it later on.
[...] The capacity of short-term memory is limited and can only hold a small amount of information. Miller (1956) presented the idea that short-term memory could only hold 5-9 chunks of information (seven plus or minus two) where a chunk is any meaningful unit. An item usually remains in short-term memory, unless it was rehearsed, for only an average of 20- to 30-sec. Long term memory is the component of memory that holds knowledge and skills for a relatively long period of time, from a few minutes to potentially a lifetime, and has no known limit on how much it can hold. [...]
[...] Future research can examine to see if three letter words are treated the same in short-term memory as nine letters or three words. Researchers can extend this study by having only three or four trials per subject, with no practice trials, and had a different group of subjects for each delay. Bibliography: James, J.S., Schneider, W., & Rodgers, K.A. (1994). Short-Term Memory. MEL LAB: Experiments in Perception, Cognition, Social Psychology and Human Factors, 113-116. Keppel, G. & Underwood, B.J. (1962). [...]
[...] Materials Researchers used an experiment, Short-term Memory, a computer based program designed for the disk of the MEL Lab Manual: Experiments, in Perception, Cognition, Social Psychology and Human Factors. The experiment took place in a small classroom where the participants were placed in cubicles where the computers were positioned. Statistics To determine if there was a significant difference in the percentage of recall a one-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was done. Post hoc tests were done between the different values of the lengths of delay in order to determine where the effects were. [...]
[...] Delay The percentage of recall decreased significantly as the length of delay increased p*. 05]. The percentage of recall at the sec. delay was significantly higher than that at the 18-sec. delay. Post Hoc on recall as a function of delay revealed an overall significance .05] within the three levels of delay. The percentage of recall in the 3-sec. delay was almost twice as much as the percentage of recall in the 18-sec. delay. There was a significant difference .05] on recall between the 3-sec. [...]
[...] There was also a significant difference .05] on recall between the 3-sec. delay and the 18-sec. delay. However there was no significant difference in recall between the 9-sec. delay and the 18- sec. delay, Results in figure the percentage of recall as a function of the length of delay was illustrated. There was a 16% decrease in recall between the sec. delay and the 9-sec. delay conditions, whereas, the percentage of recall between the 3-sec. delay and the 18-sec. delay decreased by 30%. [...]
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