short term memory experiments

Peterson and Peterson Experiment: Duration of Short-term Memory

Saul McLeod, PhD

Editor-in-Chief for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MRes, PhD, University of Manchester

Saul McLeod, PhD., is a qualified psychology teacher with over 18 years of experience in further and higher education. He has been published in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Clinical Psychology.

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Olivia Guy-Evans, MSc

Associate Editor for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MSc Psychology of Education

Olivia Guy-Evans is a writer and associate editor for Simply Psychology. She has previously worked in healthcare and educational sectors.

When a person tries to memorize words or numbers, they rehearse the item to remember it for a longer time. In this experiment, rehearsal was prevented leading to decay in memory.

To investigate the duration of short-term memory.

Lloyd and Margaret Peterson aimed to test the hypothesis that information that is not rehearsed is lost quickly from short-term memory.

A lab experiment was conducted in which 24 participants (psychology students) had to recall trigrams (meaningless three-consonant syllables), such as TGH, CLS.

The trigrams were presented one at a time and had to be recalled after intervals of 3, 6, 9, 12, 15 or 18 seconds respectively for each trial.

No two successive trigrams contained any of the same letters.

After hearing a trigram, participants were asked to count backward in threes or fours from a specified random digit number until they saw a red light appear (then they recalled the trigram). This is known as the Brown Peterson technique, which aimed to prevent rehearsal.

The independent variable was the time interval between hearing the experimenter say the trigram and the participant recalling the trigram (after seeing a red light), e.g. 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, or 18 seconds.

The dependent variable was the number of trigrams correctly recalled by the participants after every trial. There were six trials in total.

Their results showed that the longer each student had to count backwards, the less well they were able to recall the trigram accurately.

After 3 seconds 80% of the trigrams were recalled correctly.
After 6 seconds this fell to 50%.
After 18 seconds less than 10% of the trigrams were recalled correctly.

Short-term memory has a limited duration (of about 18 seconds) when rehearsal is prevented. It is thought that this information is lost from short-term memory from trace decay.

The results of the study also show the short-term memory is different from long-term memory in terms of duration. Thus supporting the multi-store model of memory .

If a person is not able to rehearse information, it will not transfer to their long-term memory store.

Critical Evaluation

In this study, the researchers used fixed timings for participants to count backwards from. They also eliminated noise and other factors that could have had an influence on memory.

The research can therefore be said to have good control, using standardized procedures to make sure all participants experienced the same process. This means that the study is scientific because it can be replicated and the reliability of the findings can be checked to make sure they were not a one-off result.

However, the experimental method lacked mundane realism and external validity as they used very artificial stimuli (i.e., people do not try to recall trigrams in real life).

Also, this study only considered short-term memory duration for one type of stimuli. They did not provide information about other types of stimuli such as pictures and melodies.

One important practical application of this study is that it demonstrates how interference in the form of verbal distractions can affect our ability to retain information.

This implies that when we are revising for an exam or trying to memorize a shopping list before we pop to the shop, we should take care to avoid distractions.

Peterson, L.R., & Peterson, M.J. (1959). Short-term retention of individual verbal items . Journal of Experimental Psychology , 58, 193-198

What is the Brown Peterson task method?

The Brown Peterson task is a cognitive psychology experimental method used to study the duration of short-term memory. Participants are presented with a series of items to remember, and then engaged in a distracting task to prevent rehearsal. They are later tested on their ability to recall the original items.

What was the dependent variable in Peterson and Peterson’s 1959 study on short-term memory?

The dependent variable in Peterson and Peterson’s 1959 study on short-term memory was the participants’ ability to recall and correctly reproduce the trigram (three-letter nonsense syllables) after a specified delay interval. The researchers measured the accuracy of recall to assess the duration of short-term memory.

What was the independent variable in Peterson and Peterson’s 1959 study on short-term memory?

The independent variable was the length of the delay interval between the presentation of the trigram (three-letter nonsense syllables) and the recall task. Different delay intervals, such as 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, or 18 seconds, were used to examine the effect of time on the decay of information in short-term memory.

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A Simple DIY Short-Term Memory Experiment

Test Your Memory With Lists of Words

Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

Amanda Tust is an editor, fact-checker, and writer with a Master of Science in Journalism from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.

Muharrem Oner / Getty Images

Short-term memory is the part of memory that stores a limited amount of information for a short amount of time. It's brief (about 20 to 30 seconds), and you can only remember so much information (such as a five to nine-word list).

If you want to see for yourself just how short your short-term memory really is, try memorizing some of the word lists below. It can be a great way to learn more about your own limits and can even be an excellent exercise for boosting your memory powers.

At a Glance

Short-term memory experiments often involve memorizing a list of words and then trying to remember them. Most people can hold five to nine words in short-term memory, but your own abilities may vary. You can learn more by using some of the memory test words below. If your results leave something to be desired, performing similar memory challenges may help you gradually boost your abilities.

Test Your Memory With Word Lists

This quick short-term memory test is a simple psychology experiment you can try at home. You can do this experiment on your own or with a small group of volunteers. By seeing how many words you can memorize in a brief period of time, you can learn more about both the capacity and duration of short-term memory .

Look at the list of words below for two minutes. Memorize as many words as you can in this amount of time. Next, get out a sheet of paper. Without looking at the list, give yourself two minutes to write down as many words from the list as you can.

How many words did you get correct? Despite having two minutes to memorize the words, you may have found it surprisingly difficult to recall even a handful of words.

This experiment demonstrates some of the limitations of short-term memory. According to researcher George A. Miller, the typical storage capacity for short-term memory is seven, plus or minus two items.

Try Chunking to Remember More

While short-term memory capacity is limited, some strategies may help improve it a bit. Memory rehearsal strategies, such as chunking , can significantly increase memorization and recall.

Because these items can be easily grouped based on category, you can probably remember far more of these words. Clustering can be a useful memorization strategy that can improve the retention and recall of information.

Perform Your Own Word Memorization Experiment

There are a number of different approaches you could take in conducting your own word memorization experiment.

Compare random words versus related words . Create two lists of words: One that is completely random and another that has groups of related words. Ask participants to first complete one trial with the random words, and then complete another trial with the related words. Compare the results of the two trials.
Compare results between male and female participants . Have a group of participants perform the memorization activity, and then compare how many words the male participants remembered on average to how many the female participants remembered.
Try the experiment with gender-associated terms versus gender-neutral terms . Create a list of terms related to objects or concepts commonly associated with women or men. Then create a list of neutral terms. Administer both tests to a group and compare the results between the men and women. Did women or men find it easier to remember the gender-associated terms? Or were the results insignificant?
Compare results among different age groups . For example, create a group of school-age children, a group of college students, a group of middle-aged adults, and a group of older adults. Give the same test to each participant and then compare the results of each group. Which group performed the best? Which one performed the worst? What do these results have to say about memory and age?

Key Questions for Background Research

On average, how many words can a person remember?
Can other factors such as gender and age have an impact on memory?
Do people tend to remember certain words more than others?
What strategies might improve memorization?

When you are exploring psychology experiment ideas , be sure to understand how to conduct a psychology experiment to get accurate results and to perform experiments ethically.

Factors That Impact Performance on Word Lists

How well you do at recalling words on a memorization list depends on a variety of factors. Some issues that can affect your performance on memorization lists include things such as:

Side effects of medications
Sleep deprivation
Substance use

Another issue that might play a role is the serial position effect. It involves a tendency to recall words at the beginning or end of a list while having difficulty remembering those in the middle.

Better recall for words at the beginning of a list is known as the primacy effect , and better recall for those at the end of a list is the recency effect .

How to Improve Your Short-Term Memory

If you'd like to strengthen your memory, some strategies can help you boost your memorization powers.

Brain training : Some research has found that cognitive training can help slow brain aging and sharpen your mental skills, including short-term memory. Practicing memorizing word lists on your own is one strategy, but there are also many online brain games and apps that can be helpful.
Healthy habits : The Alzheimer's Association suggests that strategies such as regular exercise, avoiding smoking, eating a balanced diet, and getting enough rest are crucial for protecting brain health and memory.
Try mnemonics : Songs, rhymes, and acronyms are examples of memory devices that can help you remember things more effectively. For example, when you are memorizing a list of words, you might try singing the list to the tune of a familiar melody. Some research suggests that using such tools can boost your memory by as much as 20%!
Manage your stress : Chronic stress can take a serious toll on your health and mental well-being, but it can also worsen your memory and concentration. That's why it's so crucial to find ways to minimize and manage stress effectively. Self-care can help, as can using stress management techniques like deep breathing and meditation.
Consider herbal memory boosters : Certain herbs purportedly have memory benefits and other positive effects on brain health. Sage, ginseng, and lemon balm are a few that may have a positive impact on memory.

Always check with your doctor before trying any herbal supplement or remedy.

When to Get Help

Less than stellar performance on a memory word list isn't necessarily a reason for concern. It might mean you are distracted, tired, or have difficulty concentrating. If you are noticing other problems with your memory, however, it is essential to discuss your concerns with your doctor.

Your doctor can evaluate your symptoms to determine if a medical or mental health condition might be affecting your memory.

Mental conditions such as depression can lead to problems with memory and concentration. Medical conditions affecting memory include mild cognitive impairment, dementia, Alzheimer's disease , infections, and medication side effects.

Kelley P, Evans MDR, Kelley J. Making memories: Why time matters . Front Hum Neurosci . 2018;12:400. doi:10.3389/fnhum.2018.00400

Von Bastian CC, Oberauer K. Effects and mechanisms of working memory training: A review . Psychol Res . 2013;78(6):803-820. doi:10.1007/s00426-013-0524-6

National Institute on Aging. Do memory problems always mean Alzheimer's disease ?

Gicas KM, Honer WG, Wilson RS, et al. Association of serial position scores on memory tests and hippocampal-related neuropathologic outcomes . Neurology . 2020;95(24):e3303-e3312. doi:10.1212/WNL.0000000000010952

Hampshire A, Sandrone S, Hellyer PJ. A large-scale, cross-sectional investigation into the efficacy of brain training . Front Hum Neurosci . 2019;13:221. doi:10.3389/fnhum.2019.00221

Alzheimer's Association. 10 ways to love your brain .

Knott D, Thaut MH. Musical mnemonics enhance verbal memory in typically developing children . Front Educ . 2018;3. doi:10.3389/feduc.2018.00031

Yaribeygi H, Panahi Y, Sahraei H, Johnston TP, Sahebkar A. The impact of stress on body function: A review . EXCLI J . 2017;16:1057-1072. doi:10.17179/excli2017-480

National Institute on Aging. Memory, forgetfulness, and aging: What's normal and what's not ?

By Kendra Cherry, MSEd Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

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Neuroscience For Kids

Memory experiments, on-line short term memory games.

Grades K-12

Think you have a good memory? Then take this little Short Term Memory Test . Also, test your memory for pictures with this Short Term Memory Picture Game

On-line "Simon Says" Memory Games

Simon says, "Play These Games!" to test your memory. Both SIMON games require that your browser is "JAVA-enabled."

Play SIMON SAYS Game 1
Play SIMON SAYS Game 2

Try Game 1 with and without sound. Do you do better with the sound on or with the sound off?

Face Memory Test

How good is your memory for faces? Find out with the Face Memory Test.

There are two versions of the test:

Face Memory Test - Version 1
Face Memory Test - Version 2

Now You See It, Now You Don't

Let's test short term memory . Get a tray or a large plate. (The kind of trays from the cafeteria work well). Put 10 to 20 objects on the tray, then cover them with a towel or cloth. Tell your subjects that you have a number of objects on the tray and that you want them to remember as many items as possible. Also tell them that they will have only one minute to view them. Then take off the cover from the tray and start timing one minute. After one minute, cover up the tray. Have your subjects write down all the items that they can remember. Could they remember all of the items? Are there any items that were forgotten by all the subjects? Teach your subjects some of the memory techniques (see below) and repeat the experiment.

Tray or plate
10-20 small items (like an eraser, pencil, coin, marble, etc.)
Cloth or towel to cover the tray
Paper and pencils for your subjects to write down what they remember

What's Missing

This experiment is a variation of the previous experiment to test short term memory. Get your tray and items and cloth ready again. This time have you subjects view the items for 1 minute. Then cover the tray again. Without the subjects seeing, REMOVE 1 item from the tray. Show the tray and remaining items to your subjects again. Ask them, "What is missing?". Can they guess what you removed?

Try it again giving the subjects more time to view all the items.
Try it with less time.
Try it with more objects on the tray.
Try it with fewer objects, but have your subject identify the missing object feeling the remaining objects without seeing them.
Try it again, but this time remove 3-4 objects.

Who's Missing

Think you know your classmates? Let's see how good your memory for them really is. Have one student leave the room. While this student is out of the room, have another student hide. Then bring the first student back into the room. Can this student name the student who is missing?

Classroom Mix-up

This game is a bit like "Who's Missing". This time a few students or the whole class can test their memory at the same time. Tell everyone to take a good look around the classroom. Ask them to remember where objects are located in the room. Then send a few students out of the room while you change the location of various objects in the class. You could also do this while the students are at recess or lunch. When the students come back into the classroom, ask them to write down all of the things that have changed. Make sure you keep a list of all the things that you have changed!

Everyday Memory

Grades 3-12

Go to the Exploratorium to see if you remember what this common everyday object really looks like. What can it be? What can it be?

This experiment is based on a study by Nickerson, R.S. and Adams, M.J. titled "Long-term memory for a common object," Cognitive Psychology , 11:297-307, 1979.

Eyewitness Game

Have you ever been an eyewitness to a crime? Is your memory of the crime the same as other people's recollection? Here is a way to explore eyewitness memory. Plan to have someone (a teacher or a student) come into your class. Let's call this person, "X". X should plan on doing several things in class such as:

Change the time on the clock
Take a book and put it in a bag
Erase the chalkboard
Close a window
Talk to someone

Before X comes into the room, have all of the students working or reading at their desks. When X comes into the room, most of the students will be curious about what he or she is doing. After X leaves the room, have the students write down all the things that happened. (You can do this immediately after X leaves or sometime later). Once everyone has finished writing, find out what everyone remembers and what they did not.

What details do they recall? What did X wear? How long was X in the room? What book did X take? Who did X talk to? What did X say? You may even ask some leading questions to influence memory. For example, if X was not wearing a hat, ask, "What color hat was X wearing?". Compare how everyone's memory was the same and different.

False Memories

Sometimes your brain makes up its own memories. Try to "implant" a memory by asking people to remember the words on list 1. Wait about five minutes, then probe their memory by asking them which words on list 2 they remember.

List 1: read, pages, letters, school, study, reading, stories, sheets, cover, pen, pencil, magazine, paper, words

List 2: house, pencil, apple, shoe, book, flag, rock, train, ocean, hill, music, water, glass, school

Did they say that "book" was on list 1? Only pencil and school were on list 1.

Try these words:

List 1: sheets, pillow, mattress, blanket, comfortable, room, dream, lay, chair, rest, tired, night, dark, time

List 2: door, tree, eye, song, pillow, juice, orange, radio, rain, car, sleep, cat, dream, eat

Did they say that "sleep" was on list 1? Only pillow and dream were on list 1.

Make up your own lists and see if you can create a false memory.

Concentration

Deck of playing cards

On-line Brain Concentration Game and Sensory Concentration Game

Test your memory with this on-line concentration game by locating the matching brains of different animals and matching the senses. These games require that your browser is "JAVA-enabled."

PLAY BRAIN CONCENTRATION

PLAY SENSORY CONCENTRATION

The Memory Game

How good is your memory? I will present you with a table of 25 different objects. Look at them for 30 seconds, then close the object window to return to this page. Then write down all the objects that you can remember.

Here are the 25 objects .

How did you do? How many did you remember? Try some of the memory techniques (see below) and see if you do better.

Pencil (or pen) and paper

There's a Chunk

Does this chunking really work? Find out. Get a partner. Tell your partner that you are going to read some numbers and you want him or her to remember as many as possible. Don't tell your partner how many numbers or what range they will be in. Read these numbers in the following order at a rate of about 1 every second:

9 1 5 11 2 4 6 15 10 3 7 13 12 8 14

Immediately ask your partner to write down the numbers he or she remembers. Now tell your partner that you will read another set of numbers and you want him or her to remember them. Read these numbers in the following order at a rate of about 1 every second:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Immediately ask your partner to write down the numbers he or she remembers. Was the second time easier? Did your partner remember more numbers the second time? Both sets of numbers are exactly the same...it is just that the second one can really be "chunked" into 1...one series of numbers that is easy to remember.

More memory tricks and mnemonics from "Mind Tools"

A Trip to Memory Market

Write a story about a trip to the grocery store. In the story include many food items (10-20 items) that you bought. Read your story to the class and see how many items they can remember. Use the memory tricks and tips (see below) to increase the number of items that can be remembered.

Look up a random phone number in the phone book. Take about one minute to memorize the phone number. Can you remember it 5 minutes later? 1 hour later? 6 hours later? The next day?

Grocery Store

Here is another grocery store game, called "Grocery Store" how original).

Get everyone together. The first player starts the grocery list by saying "I went to the grocery story and bought some ____." The player should fill in the blank with an item from the grocery store. For example, the player could say "I went to the grocery story and bought some apples." The next player must repeat the list and add a second item. For example, the second player can say, "I went to the grocery store and bought some apples and a bag of potato chips." The third player must create a list using apples, bag of chips and add a third item. The game continues until someone forgets one of the items.

Now or Later - The "Recency/Primary" Effect

Grades 6-12

Here is a memory experiment that requires a group of subjects to test. Get 5 or more friends to serve as your experimental subjects. Tell them that you will read a list of 20 words and that their job is to remember as many of the words as possible. Read the following list of 20 words at a rate of 1 word every second. Ask your subjects to write down the words that they can remember immediately after you finish reading the list.

Here is the list of words:

cat apple ball tree square head house door box car king hammer milk fish book tape arrow flower key shoe

Find out if there was better recall of any particular words on your list.
Was there better recall of words that were read first or last?

To do this assign a "position" to each word that you read. So, "cat" was word #1, apple was word #2, ball was word #3,....,shoe was word #20. Calculate the percent of recall for each word. For example, if you had 10 subjects and 7 of them remembered the word "cat", then "cat" (word #1) had a percent recall of 70%. Calculate the percent of recall for each of the 20 words.

Now plot your results: the X-axis will be word position and the Y-axis will be % recall. Do you see a pattern? Does is look anything at all like this figure?:

The results of this kind of experiment usually result in a graph similar to this one. This kind of graph is called a "serial-position curve." Words read first and words read last are remembered better than words read in the middle of a list.

This type of experiment provides evidence that there are 2 types of memory processes. It is thought that memory is good for the words read last because they are still in short term memory - this is the recency effect. Memory is good for the words read first because they made it into long term memory - this is the primacy effect.

It is also possible that some words in the list were very easy to recall for other reasons. For example, if your teacher just dropped a hammer on his or her toe, then everyone may find that the word "hammer" was easy to remember. Or perhaps, the last name of someone in the group of subjects is "King", then everyone would remember the word "king".

You can try this experiment again with a slight twist. Ask a new set of subjects to remember the same set of words. However, immediately after you finish reading the list, DISTRACT your subjects by having them count backwards from 100 by threes (100, 97, 94, 91, etc) for about 15-30 seconds. Plot your serial position curve again. Do you see any changes? Usually, distraction causes people to forget the words at the end of the list. Did it happen to your subjects?

A Head for Numbers

Grades 1-12

Concrete Words, Abstract Words and Just Plain Nonsense

The ability to recall a word depends on how meaningful the word is to a person. Along with the meaningfulness of a word, the "concreteness" of a word is important for memory. Concreteness refers the ability of a word to form a mental image. A word with high concreteness is easy to "see"; a word with low concreteness (an "abstract" word) is difficult to visualize.

Here are three lists of words: concrete words, abstract words and nonsense words. See which list is easier to memorize. You could also read these lists to other people to see how many words from each list they remember.

Concrete Words

alligator - apple - arrow - baby - bird - book - butterfly - car - corn - flower - hammer - house - money - microscope - ocean - pencil - rock - shoes - table - window

Abstract Words

anger - belief - boredom - chance - concept - effort - fate - freedom - glory - happiness - honor - hope - idea - interest - knowledge - mercy - mood - moral - theory - truth

Nonsense Words

ator - botam - crov - difim - firap - glimoc - ricul- hilnim - jolib - kepwin - leptav - lumal - mib - natpem - peyrim - rispaw - stiwin - tubiv - vopec - yapib

The concrete words and abstract words were scored as having high and low concreteness, respectively, in a paper by A. Paivio, J.C. Yuille and S.A. Madigan, Concreteness, imagery, and meaningfulness values for 925 nouns, Journal of Experimental Psychology , Monograph Suppl., vol. 76, no.1, part 2, pages 1-25, 1968.

Memory Methods and Techniques

After you learn some of these methods, try to memorize a list of words. See if you can remember the list the next day. How many can you remember the next week!

Technique 1: Visualize It! - Visualization

When you have an item to remember, "see" it in your mind. The more absurd you make the image the more likely you are to remember it. For example, if you go to the mall and park the car on the level C in space #5, you might imagine that there are 5 Cats waiting in your car for your return. The Cats is for the level "C"; the 5 of course is for the space #5.

Technique 2: Chain It! - Chaining

Chaining is a form of visualizing, but now you might have to remember several items in order. This time you must link the items together by thinking of images that connect them. While a grocery list does not necessarily have to be remembered in order (although it sometimes helps to find things faster), let's use it as an example: milk, bread, eggs, cheese, orange juice. Now, chain them with images:

A carton of milk pouring onto bread.
A sandwich (the bread) with raw eggs on it.
Eggs stuck in the holes of a Swiss cheese.
Pieces of cheese hanging from an orange tree.

Here is a longer list of words to try:

shoe - piano - tree - pencil - bird - bus - book - dog - pizza - flower - basketball - door - TV - rabbit - spoon - eye - chair - house - computer - rock

You may find that bizarre and wild associations are easy to remember. Here is an example of chaining for the first three words (shoe - piano - tree) of this list.

Technique 3: Place It! - The Method of Loci

Location, Location, Location. Devised during the Roman Empire, the method of loci uses the chaining method with a twist. Now all the items to-be-remembered are linked to specific places in the order you would visit them. For example, you might think of the route you take to school:

Your room (you wake up)
Your kitchen (you have breakfast)
Front door of your house
Friend's house that you see from the bus
Gas Station that you see from the bus
Market that you see from the bus

Now you must link the items that you want remembered to each of these places. You have to remember the places first, of course, but this should be easy. Then chain each item to the places...remember, the more wild your idea the better. Using the grocery store example again: milk pouring on you in your room, bread that you can't get out of the toaster (kitchen), eggs splattered on your front door, etc.

Technique 4: Chunk It! - Chunking

Ever wonder why phone numbers are really one 3 digit number and one 4 digit number and NOT one 7 digit number. It's 999-9999, not 9999999. Or what about those social security numbers. It's 999-99-9999, not 999999999. They are a lot easy to remember in small chunks. Remembering things is easier when they are in pieces.

Technique 5: Acrostic It! - Those Catchy Phrases

An acrostic is a phrase that uses the first letter of a word to remember it. In neuroanatomy, one of the most familiar ones is:

On Old Olympus Towering Top A Famous Vocal German Viewed Some Hops.

"What does this mean", you ask. Well, the first letters of each of these words in this little phrase stand for the first letters of each of the cranial nerves , in order:

Olfactory nerve (I), Optic nerve (II), Oculomotor nerve (III), Trochlear nerve (IV), Trigeminal nerve (V), Abducens nerve (VI), Facial nerve (VII), Vestibulocochlear (VIII), Glossopharyngeal nerve (IX), Vagus nerve (X), Spinal accessory nerve (XI), Hypoglossal nerve (XII).

Here's another one:

My Very Early Morning Jam Sandwich Usually Nauseates People

My Very Excellent Mom Just Served Us Nine Pizzas

These two phrases represent the order of planets from the Sun:

Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto

One last one...do you know the order of colors in a rainbow? Just remember this person's name: Roy G. Biv

R=red; O=orange Y=yellow G=green B=blue; I=indigo V=violet

Simply "A-maze-ing"

Let's see if we can demonstrate some fast learning.

[Maze 1 - easy]
[Maze 2 - harder]
[Maze 3 - hardest]

(Click on the maze, then "save" the big maze or just print it out). Get at least 3 copies of each maze. When you have the maze, have a friend keep track of the amount of time it takes you to complete the maze...go from "START" to "FINISH" on the maze. Record the amount of time it takes you. Then, do the SAME maze over again on a new copy of the same maze. Record the amount of time it takes you to complete it. Then do it a third time and even a fourth time if you want. Does it take you less time to complete the maze on the second, third and fourth time? I hope so...you are learning!! By the way, you could do this same experiment with a jigsaw puzzle.

A stopwatch or clock with a second hand
Pencil and paper to record times

The Space Place

This experiment involves BOTH memory and learning. Get a small object like a ball, book, block or even a crumpled up piece of paper. Put a blindfold on your subject. Place the small object on the floor about 10 feet away from your subject, but don't tell your subject where it is. Tell your subject that he or she must find the object on the floor when you say "GO". When you do say "GO", start a stopwatch and measure the amount of time it takes your subject to find the object. Don't let your subject get too far away from the object and don't let your subject bump into anything dangerous, but let your subject find the object without too much help. Once your subject has found the object, stop the stopwatch and record the amount of time it took to find the object.

Repeat your experiment with the same subject. Bring your subject back to the exact same spot where you started and place the object in the exact same spot as it was the first time. Say, "GO" and start your stopwatch again. Did your subject take less time to find the object? You may want to repeat the test several more times and plot the amount of time it took to find the object for the different times you ran the test. Do you see a decrease in the amount of time to find the object in later tests? What would happen if you tested the same subject the next day?

Small object (such as a ball or book)

Concentration Game - Learning

Have one person (the "setter") set up matched pairs of playing card like in the concentration game. Have this person "map" where each of the cards was located at the start of the game. Have another person (the player) play the concentration game as fast as he can. Time how long it takes the player to finish the game. Record the time. Have the setter, use the map and place the cards back in their original positions. So the cards will be in exactly the same locations for the second game. Have the player match the cards again and record the time. Reset the cards and play again. Play a few more times...does the time it takes to finish the game get shorter?

Have you ever wondered how they train animals to do tricks in the circus or on TV? One way that trainers teach animals to learn new things is through a method called shaping. This technique involves reinforcing each behavior that looks like the final act you want. In other words, the trainer gives the animal a treat each time the animal does something that looks like the final behavior.

Now it's your turn to shape a friend. First, get a collection of "treats"...these could be little candies or pennies or buttons. Without telling your friend the exact behavior you would like to see, just say that you will give him or her a treat when they do the right thing. The FINAL right thing may be to turn off a light or pick up a pencil or open a book.

Let's say the final behavior you are looking for is to have your friend turn off a light. Start giving treats when your friend gets up. Give another when your friend starts to walk. Give another one when your friend gets close to the light. Give another when your friend touches the light. Give another when your friend turns off the light. Do not give treats for behaviors that are not related to turning off the light.

You can shape almost any behavior as long as your friend is interested in getting the treat.

Motor Learning

Use this easy-to-build device to test motor learning. It's like the old "operation" game. Follow the diagram below to build the wire maze. Your wire maze must be a material that is electrically conductive. A coat hanger works as long as it does not have any paint on it. Attach a loop of a hanger to a wire, then attach the wire to the battery. Attach the battery (9 volt) to the buzzer (or light) using wire. Attach the buzzer to the wire maze using more wire.

Thread the loop of the metal hanger through the wire maze. Measure the time it takes to get from one end of the maze to the other. Also count the number of errors (buzzes) during each trial. Go through the maze several times and plot the amount of time and number of errors vs. the trial number on a graph.

9 Volt battery
Buzzer or small DC powered light
Hanger (for the maze and the loop)
Wire (to create an electrical circuit)
Wood Holder (or other material to hold the maze)

More Resources

Memory: A five-day unit lesson plan for high school psychology teachers from the Teachers of Psychology in Secondary Schools (American Psychological Association, 2013).

How to Do a Psychology Short-Term Memory Experiment

Introduction: How to Do a Psychology Short-Term Memory Experiment

Step 1: Gather Supplies

Step 2: First Volunteer and Study Explanation

Step 3: Preparation to Begin

Step 4: First Trial of Word Memorization

Step 5: First Trial of Word Recall

Step 6: Second Word List Trial

Step 7: Debriefing

Step 8: Second Volunteer

Step 9: Third Volunteer

Step 10: Fourth Volunteer

Step 11: General Conclusions

Step 12: Important Note

Step 13: Step 15:

Learn More Psychology

Memory Psychology

10 Influential Memory Theories and Studies in Psychology

Discover the experiments and theories that shaped our understanding of how we develop and recall memories..

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10 Influential Memory Theories and Studies in Psychology

How do our memories store information? Why is it that we can recall a memory at will from decades ago, and what purpose does forgetting information serve?

The human memory has been the subject of investigation among many 20th Century psychologists and remains an active area of study for today’s cognitive scientists. Below we take a look at some of the most influential studies, experiments and theories that continue to guide our understanding of the function of memory.

1 Multi-Store Model

(atkinson & shiffrin, 1968).

An influential theory of memory known as the multi-store model was proposed by Richard Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin in 1968. This model suggested that information exists in one of 3 states of memory: the sensory, short-term and long-term stores . Information passes from one stage to the next the more we rehearse it in our minds, but can fade away if we do not pay enough attention to it. Read More

Information enters the memory from the senses - for instance, the eyes observe a picture, olfactory receptors in the nose might smell coffee or we might hear a piece of music. This stream of information is held in the sensory memory store , and because it consists of a huge amount of data describing our surroundings, we only need to remember a small portion of it. As a result, most sensory information ‘ decays ’ and is forgotten after a short period of time. A sight or sound that we might find interesting captures our attention, and our contemplation of this information - known as rehearsal - leads to the data being promoted to the short-term memory store , where it will be held for a few hours or even days in case we need access to it.

The short-term memory gives us access to information that is salient to our current situation, but is limited in its capacity.

Therefore, we need to further rehearse information in the short-term memory to remember it for longer. This may involve merely recalling and thinking about a past event, or remembering a fact by rote - by thinking or writing about it repeatedly. Rehearsal then further promotes this significant information to the long-term memory store, where Atkinson and Shiffrin believed that it could survive for years, decades or even a lifetime.

Key information regarding people that we have met, important life events and other important facts makes it through the sensory and short-term memory stores to reach the long-term memory .

Learn more about Atkinson and Shiffrin’s Multi-Store Model

2 Levels of Processing

(craik & lockhart, 1972).

Fergus Craik and Robert Lockhart were critical of explanation for memory provided by the multi-store model, so in 1972 they proposed an alternative explanation known as the levels of processing effect . According to this model, memories do not reside in 3 stores; instead, the strength of a memory trace depends upon the quality of processing , or rehearsal , of a stimulus . In other words, the more we think about something, the more long-lasting the memory we have of it ( Craik & Lockhart , 1972). Read More

Craik and Lockhart distinguished between two types of processing that take place when we make an observation : shallow and deep processing. Shallow processing - considering the overall appearance or sound of something - generally leads to a stimuli being forgotten. This explains why we may walk past many people in the street on a morning commute, but not remember a single face by lunch time.

Deep (or semantic) processing , on the other hand, involves elaborative rehearsal - focusing on a stimulus in a more considered way, such as thinking about the meaning of a word or the consequences of an event. For example, merely reading a news story involves shallow processing, but thinking about the repercussions of the story - how it will affect people - requires deep processing, which increases the likelihood of details of the story being memorized.

In 1975, Craik and another psychologist, Endel Tulving , published the findings of an experiment which sought to test the levels of processing effect.

Participants were shown a list of 60 words, which they then answered a question about which required either shallow processing or more elaborative rehearsal. When the original words were placed amongst a longer list of words, participants who had conducted deeper processing of words and their meanings were able to pick them out more efficiently than those who had processed the mere appearance or sound of words ( Craik & Tulving , 1975).

Learn more about Levels of Processing here

3 Working Memory Model

(baddeley & hitch, 1974).

Whilst the Multi-Store Model (see above) provided a compelling insight into how sensory information is filtered and made available for recall according to its importance to us, Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch viewed the short-term memory (STM) store as being over-simplistic and proposed a working memory model (Baddeley & Hitch, 1974), which replace the STM.

The working memory model proposed 2 components - a visuo-spatial sketchpad (the ‘inner eye’) and an articulatory-phonological loop (the ‘inner ear’), which focus on a different types of sensory information. Both work independently of one another, but are regulated by a central executive , which collects and processes information from the other components similarly to how a computer processor handles data held separately on a hard disk. Read More

According to Baddeley and Hitch, the visuo-spatial sketchpad handles visual data - our observations of our surroundings - and spatial information - our understanding of objects’ size and location in our environment and their position in relation to ourselves. This enables us to interact with objects: to pick up a drink or avoid walking into a door, for example.

The visuo-spatial sketchpad also enables a person to recall and consider visual information stored in the long-term memory. When you try to recall a friend’s face, your ability to visualize their appearance involves the visuo-spatial sketchpad.

The articulatory-phonological loop handles the sounds and voices that we hear. Auditory memory traces are normally forgotten but may be rehearsed using the ‘inner voice’; a process which can strengthen our memory of a particular sound.

Learn more about Baddeley and Hitch’s working memory model here

4 Miller’s Magic Number

(miller, 1956).

Prior to the working memory model, U.S. cognitive psychologist George A. Miller questioned the limits of the short-term memory’s capacity. In a renowned 1956 paper published in the journal Psychological Review , Miller cited the results of previous memory experiments, concluding that people tend only to be able to hold, on average, 7 chunks of information (plus or minus two) in the short-term memory before needing to further process them for longer storage. For instance, most people would be able to remember a 7-digit phone number but would struggle to remember a 10-digit number. This led to Miller describing the number 7 +/- 2 as a “magical” number in our understanding of memory. Read More

But why are we able to remember the whole sentence that a friend has just uttered, when it consists of dozens of individual chunks in the form of letters? With a background in linguistics, having studied speech at the University of Alabama, Miller understood that the brain was able to ‘chunk’ items of information together and that these chunks counted towards the 7-chunk limit of the STM. A long word, for example, consists of many letters, which in turn form numerous phonemes. Instead of only being able to remember a 7-letter word, the mind “recodes” it, chunking the individual items of data together. This process allows us to boost the limits of recollection to a list of 7 separate words.

Miller’s understanding of the limits of human memory applies to both the short-term store in the multi-store model and Baddeley and Hitch’s working memory. Only through sustained effort of rehearsing information are we able to memorize data for longer than a short period of time.

Read more about Miller’s Magic Number here

5 Memory Decay

(peterson and peterson, 1959).

Following Miller’s ‘magic number’ paper regarding the capacity of the short-term memory, Peterson and Peterson set out to measure memories’ longevity - how long will a memory last without being rehearsed before it is forgotten completely?

In an experiment employing a Brown-Peterson task, participants were given a list of trigrams - meaningless lists of 3 letters (e.g. GRT, PXM, RBZ) - to remember. After the trigrams had been shown, participants were asked to count down from a number, and to recall the trigrams at various periods after remembering them. Read More

The use of such trigrams makes it impracticable for participants to assign meaning to the data to help encode them more easily, while the interference task prevented rehearsal, enabling the researchers to measure the duration of short-term memories more accurately.

Whilst almost all participants were initially able to recall the trigrams, after 18 seconds recall accuracy fell to around just 10%. Peterson and Peterson’s study demonstrated the surprising brevity of memories in the short-term store, before decay affects our ability to recall them.

Learn more about memory decay here

6 Flashbulb Memories

(brown & kulik, 1977).

There are particular moments in living history that vast numbers of people seem to hold vivid recollections of. You will likely be able to recall such an event that you hold unusually detailed memories of yourself. When many people learned that JFK, Elvis Presley or Princess Diana died, or they heard of the terrorist attacks taking place in New York City in 2001, a detailed memory seems to have formed of what they were doing at the particular moment that they heard such news.

Psychologists Roger Brown and James Kulik recognized this memory phenomenon as early as 1977, when they published a paper describing flashbulb memories - vivid and highly detailed snapshots created often (but not necessarily) at times of shock or trauma. Read More

We are able to recall minute details of our personal circumstances whilst engaging in otherwise mundane activities when we learnt of such events. Moreover, we do not need to be personally connected to an event for it to affect us, and for it lead to the creation of a flashbulb memory.

Learn more about Flashbulb Memories here

7 Memory and Smell

The link between memory and sense of smell helps many species - not just humans - to survive. The ability to remember and later recognize smells enables animals to detect the nearby presence of members of the same group, potential prey and predators. But how has this evolutionary advantage survived in modern-day humans?

Researchers at the University of North Carolina tested the olfactory effects on memory encoding and retrieval in a 1989 experiment. Male college students were shown a series of slides of pictures of females, whose attractiveness they were asked to rate on a scale. Whilst viewing the slides, the participants were exposed to pleasant odor of aftershave or an unpleasant smell. Their recollection of the faces in the slides was later tested in an environment containing either the same or a different scent. Read More

The results showed that participants were better able to recall memories when the scent at the time of encoding matched that at the time of recall (Cann and Ross, 1989). These findings suggest that a link between our sense of smell and memories remains, even if it provides less of a survival advantage than it did for our more primitive ancestors.

8 Interference

Interference theory postulates that we forget memories due to other memories interfering with our recall. Interference can be either retroactive or proactive: new information can interfere with older memories (retroactive interference), whilst information we already know can affect our ability to memorize new information (proactive interference).

Both types of interference are more likely to occur when two memories are semantically related, as demonstrated in a 1960 experiment in which two groups of participants were given a list of word pairs to remember, so that they could recall the second ‘response’ word when given the first as a stimulus. A second group was also given a list to learn, but afterwards was asked to memorize a second list of word pairs. When both groups were asked to recall the words from the first list, those who had just learnt that list were able to recall more words than the group that had learnt a second list (Underwood & Postman, 1960). This supported the concept of retroactive interference: the second list impacted upon memories of words from the first list. Read More

Interference also works in the opposite direction: existing memories sometimes inhibit our ability to memorize new information. This might occur when you receive a work schedule, for instance. When you are given a new schedule a few months later, you may find yourself adhering to the original times. The schedule that you already knew interferes with your memory of the new schedule.

9 False Memories

Can false memories be implanted in our minds? The idea may sound like the basis of a dystopian science fiction story, but evidence suggests that memories that we already hold can be manipulated long after their encoding. Moreover, we can even be coerced into believing invented accounts of events to be true, creating false memories that we then accept as our own.

Cognitive psychologist Elizabeth Loftus has spent much of her life researching the reliability of our memories; particularly in circumstances when their accuracy has wider consequences, such as the testimonials of eyewitness in criminal trials. Loftus found that the phrasing of questions used to extract accounts of events can lead witnesses to attest to events inaccurately. Read More

In one experiment, Loftus showed a group of participants a video of a car collision, where the vehicle was travelling at a one of a variety of speeds. She then asked them the car’s speed using a sentence whose depiction of the crash was adjusted from mild to severe using different verbs. Loftus found when the question suggested that the crash had been severe, participants disregarded their video observation and vouched that the car had been travelling faster than if the crash had been more of a gentle bump (Loftus and Palmer, 1974). The use of framed questions, as demonstrated by Loftus, can retroactively interfere with existing memories of events.

James Coan (1997) demonstrated that false memories can even be produced of entire events. He produced booklets detailing various childhood events and gave them to family members to read. The booklet given to his brother contained a false account of him being lost in a shopping mall, being found by an older man and then finding his family. When asked to recall the events, Coan’s brother believed the lost in a mall story to have actually occurred, and even embellished the account with his own details (Coan, 1997).

10 The Weapon Effect on Eyewitness Testimonies

(johnson & scott, 1976).

A person’s ability to memorize an event inevitably depends not just on rehearsal but also on the attention paid to it at the time it occurred. In a situation such as an bank robbery, you may have other things on your mind besides memorizing the appearance of the perpetrator. But witness’s ability to produce a testimony can sometimes be affected by whether or not a gun was involved in a crime. This phenomenon is known as the weapon effect - when a witness is involved in a situation in which a weapon is present, they have been found to remember details less accurately than a similar situation without a weapon. Read More

The weapon effect on eyewitness testimonies was the subject of a 1976 experiment in which participants situated in a waiting room watched as a man left a room carrying a pen in one hand. Another group of participants heard an aggressive argument, and then saw a man leave a room carrying a blood-stained knife.

Later, when asked to identify the man in a line-up, participants who saw the man carrying a weapon were less able to identify him than those who had seen the man carrying a pen (Johnson & Scott, 1976). Witnesses’ focus of attention had been distracted by a weapon, impeding their ability to remember other details of the event.

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A Simple DIY Short-Term Memory Experiment

Short-term memory is the part of memory that stores a limited amount of information for a short amount of time. It’s brief (about 20 to 30 seconds), and you can only remember so much information (such as a five to nine-word list). 1

At a Glance

Test Your Memory With Word Lists

How many words did you get correct? Despite having two minutes to memorize the words, you may have found it surprisingly difficult to recall even a handful of words.

Try Chunking to Remember More

While short-term memory capacity is limited, some strategies may help improve it a bit. Memory rehearsal strategies, such as chunking, can significantly increase memorization and recall.

Perform Your Own Word Memorization Experiment

There are a number of different approaches you could take in conducting your own word memorization experiment.

Compare random words versus related words . Create two lists of words: One that is completely random and another that has groups of related words. Ask participants to first complete one trial with the random words, and then complete another trial with the related words. Compare the results of the two trials.
Compare results between male and female participants . Have a group of participants perform the memorization activity, and then compare how many words the male participants remembered on average to how many the female participants remembered.
Try the experiment with gender-associated terms versus gender-neutral terms . Create a list of terms related to objects or concepts commonly associated with women or men. Then create a list of neutral terms. Administer both tests to a group and compare the results between the men and women. Did women or men find it easier to remember the gender-associated terms? Or were the results insignificant?
Compare results among different age groups . For example, create a group of school-age children, a group of college students, a group of middle-aged adults, and a group of older adults. Give the same test to each participant and then compare the results of each group. Which group performed the best? Which one performed the worst? What do these results have to say about memory and age?

Key Questions for Background Research

On average, how many words can a person remember?
Can other factors such as gender and age have an impact on memory?
Do people tend to remember certain words more than others?
What strategies might improve memorization?

When you are exploring psychology experiment ideas, be sure to understand how to conduct a psychology experiment to get accurate results and to perform experiments ethically.

Factors That Impact Performance on Word Lists

How well you do at recalling words on a memorization list depends on a variety of factors. Some issues that can affect your performance on memorization lists include things such as: 3

Side effects of medications
Sleep deprivation
Substance use

Another issue that might play a role is the serial position effect. It involves a tendency to recall words at the beginning or end of a list while having difficulty remembering those in the middle.

Better recall for words at the beginning of a list is known as the primacy effect, and better recall for those at the end of a list is the recency effect. 4

How to Improve Your Short-Term Memory

If you’d like to strengthen your memory, some strategies can help you boost your memorization powers.

Brain training : Some research has found that cognitive training can help slow brain aging and sharpen your mental skills, including short-term memory. 5 Practicing memorizing word lists on your own is one strategy, but there are also many online brain games and apps that can be helpful.
Healthy habits : The Alzheimer’s Association suggests that strategies such as regular exercise, avoiding smoking, eating a balanced diet, and getting enough rest are crucial for protecting brain health and memory. 6
Try mnemonics : Songs, rhymes, and acronyms are examples of memory devices that can help you remember things more effectively. For example, when you are memorizing a list of words, you might try singing the list to the tune of a familiar melody. Some research suggests that using such tools can boost your memory by as much as 20%! 7
Manage your stress : Chronic stress can take a serious toll on your health and mental well-being, but it can also worsen your memory and concentration. 8 That’s why it’s so crucial to find ways to minimize and manage stress effectively. Self-care can help, as can using stress management techniques like deep breathing and meditation.
Consider herbal memory boosters : Certain herbs purportedly have memory benefits and other positive effects on brain health. Sage, ginseng, and lemon balm are a few that may have a positive impact on memory.

Always check with your doctor before trying any herbal supplement or remedy.

When to Get Help

Less than stellar performance on a memory word list isn’t necessarily a reason for concern. It might mean you are distracted, tired, or have difficulty concentrating. If you are noticing other problems with your memory, however, it is essential to discuss your concerns with your doctor.

Your doctor can evaluate your symptoms to determine if a medical or mental health condition might be affecting your memory.

Mental conditions such as depression can lead to problems with memory and concentration. Medical conditions affecting memory include mild cognitive impairment, dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, infections, and medication side effects. 9

short term memory experiments

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