Deep and Shallow Processing

Abstract Introduction Levels of processing is a concept proposed by Craik and Lockhart (1972) that proposes that memories are stored according to how much attention we give them. There are two main levels of processing shallow and deep. Shallow level concentrates only on the visible features of the word or similarities with other word, but our brain doesn’t have to actually concentrate on the meaning of the word. Deep on the other hand focuses on the actually meaning of the word and makes us think about what it means and what other words its connected to, for example. The concept suggests that the more we think about certain words the longer we remember them. The basic idea this theory plays with is that memory is only a result of processing information. The fact that we have memories is just a by-product of our processing abilities and Craik and Lockhart also suggest there is no short or long term theory, as was suggested in the Multi-Store model of memory by Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968), where they separated memory by how long we are able to store it (sensory, short term and long term). This experiment concentrated on finding out whether people remember things better when they are associated with a meaning and are forced to think about it or it doesn’t matter how the word is presented to them. The hypothesis is that the words that are in the questions that make the participants think about the meaning (deep processing) are likely to remember more words than in the shallow processing section. Method Design This study was a within participant design with repeated measures. All of the participants performed all of the tasks. Participants 1 There were 96 participants that took part in the study. They were all undergraduate students studying at the University of Reading. The ratio or females to males was 9:1. They were mostly between the ages of 18-21, which about 9% being mature students. The participants didn’t know what the purpose of the experiment was and only found out after completing the question booklet. Materials Procedure The participants were all sat down in a big room with a presentation in the front. The presentation gave them instructions along with the researcher. Firstly, they were all given a question booklet that included two main types of questions. There was always a word and a question next to it. It either asked a question about the word: PEACH – Is this a kind of fruit? Or a question that didn’t refer to the meaning of the word: HOUSE – Does this word rhyme with mouse? See Appendix 1 for example what the question booklet looked like. They were to answer a series of these questions and then were told to put the question booklet away and given another paper with just series of words. They were asked to circle words that were in the questions in the question booklet. After that they were given a sheet with correct answers and were asked to report the amount of word remembered from both shallow and deep categories (clearly marked on the answer sheet). After that the participants were debriefed and thanked for participation. Results Discussion Conclusion Appendix Appendix 1 Levels of Processing Practical – Example or word stimuli In this booklet you will see a list of questions about words. For example, one question might be " RUBY: Is the word a type of precious stone?" To which the correct answer is of course, yes. Your task for the first part of the practical is to answer the questions. Answer the questions by circling the correct 2 response. Please answer as quickly and as accurately as possible. Hand in the booklet when you have finished or when I tell you stop, whichever happens first. Questions. WORD - QUESTION TWIG Is the word a type of fish? YES NO CHILD Does the word rhyme with stopper? YES NO GRIN Is the word a type of measurement? YES NO ROCK Does the word rhyme with stock? YES NO FLAME Is the word something hot? YES NO 3