A paired samples t-test showed a significant difference in memory between deep and shallow conditions

The measure of memory after the level of processing deep/shallow of the 1st Year Psychology Students at Middlesex.

Memory is vital in everything that we do, ‘Life without memory is a present without a past and a future’ (Lange, 1884 p=?); one of the most complex and fascinating mental processes, an important topic in cognitive psychology. Over the time, memory helped us to preserve and pass over valuable information based on which we developed and evolved (Cohen, M. D., & Bacdayan, 1994) Memory is a process through data and information we get in contact are coded, stored and updated. Thus, you can keep relevant information for a more extended period, and you can use them in the decisions you make, the activities you carry out and the future you want to build yourself (N.Holt, A.Bremner, E.Sutherland, M. Vliek,  M. Passer, R. Smith, 2015).

The levels of processing leads to a new perspective of what memory enquires, exploring long term memory as a complex process, Craik and Lockhart (1972) were the firsts who came up with this model exploring the levels of processing through two forms: deep and shallow. Low processing level involves semantic processing which happens when we encode the significance of a word, linking it with prior knowledge, relate it with a comparable one with similar meaning. Deep processing involves elaboration rehearsal which leads to a better review and requires significant analysis, close attention to details. By comparison, shallow processing involves maintenance rehearsal and lead to short-term retention of data. It is represented by structural processing which encodes physical qualities and phonemic processing which encode the sound. Clark and Lockhart (1972) study suggest and investigate that some types of information are more easily to remember than others, and that is depending on how it is encoded into memory. There are three distingue levels of encoding: visual, phonetic and semantic processing. Visual which involve structural processing is the shallowest one, the least effective, where the information less remembered and is using the optical properties to encode new information. The phonemic processing is less superficial than visual processing, and it focuses on the auditory information of the stimulus. Semantic processing is the most profound form of the processing from the three and tends to be the most effective, and it is all about the meaning, it depends on the stimulus semantic properties. The result of this is that new information is linked with existing knowledge and is encoded as part of the semantic network; this makes it easy to remember and subsequently easier to recall.

Craik and Tulving, (1975) explore earlier research of Craik and Lockhart, and they manipulate the level of processing and the rehearsal duration independently. In this study, they were looking at the differences between the type of encoding and whether the way you encoded information will change the ability to recall the information. They came up with some questions characteristic to a different level of processing is the word printed in capital letter (visual processing), does the name rime with trains, for example (acoustic processing) and last does the concept fit into a sentence (semantic processing). When they asked the individuals to indicate whether or not they see the words, semantical level- deepest had the most considerable amount of recall. Secondly, acoustical- deeper processing, how the word sounds like and the least amount of recall was the visual- shallow processing. The study concludes that the deeper you process the items that you are trying to remember the more likely you are to recall them

Bradshaw and Anderson (1982) investigate how elaboration of memory constructs (structure) influence recall precision and reaction inertness. The participants at the study had to read different data about personalities and try to memorise them. For example, must retain data such as “In a critical moment of his life, Mozart made a trip from Munich to Paris.” Some information was prepared and presented per the causes or consequences as in “Mozart wanted to leave Munich to avoid a romantic complication.” Other data were presented independently to the subjects. Later it tested the possibility of recall data and not their links. The subjects were recalled data which were accompanied by connection in a higher proportion than those which had been set independently. Allegedly adding a cause/consequence to representing data in memory, they created cognitive routes updating causes/consequences to the data memory in the following way: Mozart travelled from Munich to Paris. Mozart wanted to avoid romantic complication in Munich. When they had to recall the required data, participants could either retrieve the information directly or indirectly to rediscover the route that will leave from the cause. Even though they forgot the necessary information, they could draw it from causes or consequences. The result of the experiment is significant: when certain information associated with other information in a relevant semantic manner is easier refreshed after storage. Basically, the more we understand specific data in their connection with each other, the better we remember and memorise.

The present paperwork aims to test how the levels of processing impact memory, and if there is any significant difference between the level of processing: deep/shallow, we are aiming to find further support.

The study hypothesis is that the deeply processed information is better remembered than shallow processed information.

Method:

Participants

Within the study, N = 153 participants were 1^st-year undergraduate Psychology students at Middlesex University, from which 134 females,16 males and another three who did not disclose this information. The recruitment method was a convenience sample. We did not remove any participants as our purpose does not focus on the age or sex of the population when we are testing their memory. The population age was between 17 and 50 years old, with the mean of M = 20.46 and an SD = 5.26

Design:

The experiment has repeated measures design as it was conducted within-subjects, all the participants taking part in both conditions. The level of measurement is the ratio, as we have continuous data with an absolute zero. Our independent variable is deep and shallow levels of processing, and the conditions are deep and shallow. We measure how the levels of processing impact the memory score (DV).

Stimuli and materials:

The line drawing objects represent the object of the study method that are all presented in black at the centre of a computer with a white background screen, the size of 400/400 pixels, selected from Snodgrass, J. G. & Vanderwart, M. (1980) after testing and concluding that anyone will recognise those objects, as seen in Figure 1 below.

We used 32 objects introduced in the study phase (16 deep / 16 shallow). Twenty-four of these was shown in the memory test (8 removed as we are likely to remember the 1^st and last object from each block]), ahead with 24 new objects.

Memory score sheet had 48 objects (24 studied / 24 new) on an A4 sheet of paper, with a “Y/N” response box next to each drawing picture.

Figure1. Example of an object shown in the Deep condition within the experiment

Procedure:

The participants briefly introduced the requirements and the setup of the study, which took place in the lecture hall. The participation wasn’t paid, being part of the lecture and in the same time giving them the possibility does not present the score sheet at the end of the lecture they don’t want to take part of the study.

They were asked to do it in silence and without conferring. The study had a practice faze where participants became familiar with what was going to happen effectively before beginning the study/

They were shown 32 drawings of objects (16 were in the deep condition, and 16 were in the shallow condition) presented on the screen for 500ms and they were asked to call out loud as a class and decide whether each object is natural or humanmade. At some point, they introduced a new condition, and they were asked to call out loud whether the objects were upright or tilted. Moreover,  the conditions were alternated between natural and manmade, followed by a vertical tilt to overcome any potential problem, counterbalancing the order effect by splitting the terms.

After that they received a  score sheet with 48  drawing objects which were just projected on the screen, after removing 8 of them, the most likely to remember the first and the last one and they added another 24 of new ones and then asked to recognise the objects projected on the wall. They need to circle Yes/No if the image was presented in the paper sheet was projected on the screen. The presence of the objects seen on the screen was reflected on the sheet in red colour, the deep condition was presented in a blue box and shallow condition in a pink box. They only had 5 minutes to complete the task.

They collecting data ended with a debrief where the participants were informed that the purpose of the study is to measure the memory, that natural/humanmade it a deep processed condition, which requires to think about the nature of the object and upright/tilted a shallow prepared condition, which needs to look at the position of the object.

Results:

After introducing all the scores in SPSS, they compute a memory score deep/shallow items by taking out the numbers of new items from the number of correct ‘Yes’ answers for both conditions.

As Table 1 shows, the results tell us that they found a more excellent recall for the objects which were deeply processed rather than the shallow ones.

Table 1. Mean and Standard deviation of for Deep and Shallow conditions

Figure 2. Bar Chart of the mean memory scores in the Deep and Shallow conditions. Error bars indicate standard error of the mean.

A paired samples t-test showed a significant difference in memory between deep and shallow conditions

t (152) = 11.73, p < .0001, 95% CI [1.86, 2.61].

Discussions:

Memory is a very vital concept of the human species of human beings since they are relational people, and to be able to relate with one another effectively. They need to encode the information, store it, and retrieve it when need be. The three primary functions and processes that the memory involves in (encoding, storing, and retrieval) are affected by various steps and numerous conditions in which the person is in when they involve themselves in such activities (Mcleod, 2013). In this discussion, the paper is focusing on the effects on the memories and the measure of the memories of the 1st year psychology students. Because there are two ways, the human memory can process a piece of information that is the shallow or deep way it is prudent that at one time or the other, a person uses either of the two ways to process their information in their memories.

Deep processing, which occurs when the information is highly associated with the complex long-term memory is the place where the person has to process ad analyse the information and assign meaning to all the components of the information and store it safely for retrieval. However, if the information still has unresolved or hard-to-understand issues to the memory of the person will shallow process the information and keep it in the short-term memory, preparation, and readiness for the resolution of the smatter which seems to be complicated. It is therefore clear that the amount of information stored in the short-term memory will come to recall faster than the information in the long-term memory. However, the one information found in the long-term memory can be retrieved even after a more extended period (Artuso & Palladino, 2019). Of all the three types of processing of information is semantical processing is the fastest, followed by the acoustical, which is deeper processing and the visual, which the shallow processing.

In the test proven by the experiment done by Bradshaw and Anderson in 1982, it is clear that people best recall the memories which they attach or connect to more important things that they know. It is, therefore, more accessible to now that the form an aim as a basis on which the person will recall the memory in connection with an occurrence or situation that they attach to the information that they need to recall (Brown et al., 2016). Memories in the minds of people do not form on empty ‘plates,’ instead, they develop based on some causes and consequences that the person attributes to them. In the case of the experiment involving first years, it is prudent that all the 153 psychology students (146 females, six males and three who did not disclose their gender) were first years since that ideally postulates an equal capacity to recall. The process of incorporating the students was a highly reliable way of sampling since the experiment did not check even matters sexuality.

In the experiment, the 8 of each result helped in eradicating the bias with the probability that one is more likely to recall the first and the last figures that they see. In the second experiment involving the use of the 24 drawing objects, they were able to retain the 32 (after subtracting 8), which indicates that the change of the condition from a deeper one had an intensifying effect on the capability of the students to remember. In the last part, the lecturers eliminated the possibility of their involvement in the experiment (which relieved the students of any form of external pressure). The students were able to determine to discern the nature of the objects, whether natural or human.

From the experiment and the experimental result, is easy to discern that if anyone changes the conditions from favoring the shallow processing to that which favours the deep processing by changing the conditions from the shallow to the deep ones (like introducing studying instead of observation and silence instead of the noisy environment) the change will affect on the memory processing type. It significantly immensely improves the memory score by a significant margin. The means and the standard deviations of the two conditions, deep and shallow, also supports the observation. The deep condition processing has a higher mean of memory score of 3.13 while the mean memory score for the shallow condition processing is 0.9, such a vast margin of difference. The deviation of the deep processing condition is 4.94, which is lower than the 5.07. The readings of the deep and shallow conditions are indicators of how close the results of the deep are than those of the shallow conditions. That way, it shows deep processing of memories is less prone to errors than the shallow memory processing.

From the theory discussed before and the result of the experiment conducted by randomly selected Middlesex University, 1st Psychology students, it is clear that the deep processing of memory is more reliable than the shallow memory processing. The deeply processed information is easily remembered than the shallow processed memory, and it is less prone to errors during retrieval. It is the most reliable form of information processing that people should use for effective retrieval.