Describe the multi-store memory model. (4 marks)

The multi-store memory model was proposed by Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968) and suggests that memory consists of three stores; the sensory register, the short term memory (STM) and the long term memory (LTM). The sensory register detects a mass of information, but this only passes to the STM if we pay attention to it. If we rehearse this information extensively enough, it passes into the LTM, which supposedly has an unlimited duration and capacity. If this process of maintenance rehearsal does not take place, it simply decays and is said to be forgotten. In order to remember information stored in the LTM we must retreive it, essentially transferring back to the STM, before it is recalled.