An investigation into the Affect of Organisation on memory.

The first 200 words of this essay...

An investigation into the Affect of Organisation on memory.

This study is concerned with the cognitive approach, in particular the are of memory, and how the arrangement of data into organised and disorganised categories affects memory and the ability to store and recall data.

Research

Short-term memory is believed to have a capacity of 7±2 'chunks' of information, which can remain there for approximately 20 seconds without rehearsal.

Chunking is a process that apparently increases the capacity of short-term memory by relating and combining the incoming information to knowledge that we already possess in long term memory. In chunking we organise information giving it a structure and meaning tit did not already have, so although we can only recall around 7 chunks a meaningful chunk can be very large

Previous research has been done by other psychologists into the affect of organisation on memory.

In 1953 Bousfield asked participants to try and learn 60 words consisting of 4 categories, (animals, peoples names, professions and vegetables) with 15 examples of each all mixed up. Bousfield found that when participants free recalled (recalled in any order) they tended to cluster similar items, Eg; if someone