If this information is rehearsed enough it will travel further along down the line and get transferred into the long term memory, because of its large size information stored here can be kept from a few minutes to a lifetime. I.e. if you rehearse the telephone number enough then it will go into your long term memory and will be stored for you to access it in the future.
The main difference between the long term and short term memory stores are that they encode their data in different ways. The short term memory usually uses acoustic encoding, such as repeating a telephone number out loud. Where as the long term memory usually uses semantic or visual encoding, i.e. remembering the meaning of something or what it looks like. Below is a diagram of how the two process model works.
Evaluation of the two process model:
There are many different good and bad points when it comes to evaluating the two process model of memory.
Some of the strengths are that, it has been very influential and has helped to provide a widely used framework of study. It has also been used in order to try and explain the spiral positioning effect. Another aspect of research where the two process model has come into play is in trying to explain memory problems such as anterograde amnesia etc.
As well as its good points the two process model also has a list of weaknesses. One of them is that the research was mainly artificial, this was because it just involved people remembering meaningless lists and the subjects involved usually knew that they were taking part in an experiment so this could have effected the results. People also argued that the STM is far more complex than the model suggests. The same problem arises with the LTM because the model does not account for all of the different types of long term memory, no does I distinguish enough between the different ways in which we rehearse information as it can be done in many different ways. Also a man by the name of Jenkins (1974)found out that rehearsal was not always needed in order to remember information.
So all in all the two process model provided a good starting point for further research into the way in which our memory works but did not really go into enough detail to explain it fully.
