Memory in Cognitive Psychology

Why do we often draw analogies between human memory and computer memory, two seemingly incompatible things? Let’s recall our childhood, or that of our children, when we first encountered building blocks. At first, a small child simply examines the new objects, turning them over and enjoying their bright colors and shapes, but not yet doing anything with them. As the child grows, they might pick a favorite block and push it around, making car noises, associating the block with a real vehicle. Later, the blocks might become a train, a house, or a palace. The child is playing with blocks but associating them with real-world objects. This tendency to use associations, analogies, and metaphors helps people explain and remember things more easily. Who among us hasn’t used associations to memorize something?

A Brief History of Psychology

Looking back at the history of psychology, we see that analogies between brain processes and various devices have long been made. In the computer age, the computer became the main analogy. Earlier, Freud used electrical processes as an analogy, Pavlov compared the brain to a telephone switchboard, Ukhtomsky likened it to a radio receiver, and Zinchenko linked memory capacity to the amount of information per symbol. Each era sought the most modern ways to study the brain, with advances in engineering pushing psychologists toward new comparisons. These analogies are used as metaphors, not as direct equivalences.

The Computer Metaphor in Cognitive Psychology

Why is the computer metaphor in cognitive psychology so distinct from other technical analogies? There was a mutual influence: computer scientists and AI researchers developed a metaphor that aligned with modern psychology’s understanding of subjective experience and knowledge representation. The term “computer metaphor” likely emerged during the birth of cybernetics, with Norbert Wiener as its “father.” This metaphor doesn’t replace psychological theory but helps explain it in constructive terms and can incorporate many sciences, including technical fields.

Thanks to the development of cognitive psychology and the application of the computer metaphor, human memory has been studied in much greater depth. Cognitive psychology, the psychology of cognition, examines processes such as information acquisition, representation, storage, transformation into knowledge, and the influence of this knowledge on behavior.

Clarifying Terminology

When comparing human memory to computer memory, we focus on a specific part of the memory subsystem, including controllers and allocation mechanisms, which in modern computers are distributed across hardware and software components. This includes not just silicon chips but also the operating system and application code. Accepting the computer metaphor means adopting its terminology for describing memory processes, while understanding that it’s not a replacement for psychological theory but a tool for using constructive concepts.

In cognitive psychology, memory is seen as one aspect of the overall human information processing system. A key question is how information from episodic memory becomes basic knowledge.

The Fundamental Problem of Cognitive Psychology

In 1973, Anderson and Bower formulated the most fundamental problem facing cognitive psychology:

• How can we theoretically represent the knowledge a person possesses?
• What are the basic symbols or concepts, and how are they connected?
• How are larger knowledge structures built from them?
• How is access to this vast “card catalog” achieved, how is information searched, and how is it used in everyday problem-solving?

By addressing these questions, cognitive psychology has strengthened its position and helped resolve many issues in the psychology of memory.

Research on the Structural Organization of Memory

There are countless models of information processing—almost as many as there are researchers in the field. What they have in common are block diagrams, with each block performing a specific function (much like a child assigning roles to each block). Information passes through various functional blocks, with connections indicating the flow of information. Today, the computer metaphor is the most suitable for studying the structural organization of memory. Different scientists have likened memory to a library, a workshop, or a storage facility, but the main blocks—working and external memory—remain central.

For example, according to Ulric Neisser, sensory information is processed in peripheral types of memory, then enters verbal short-term memory for preliminary processing and storage of current events, and after detailed processing, is stored in long-term memory for extended periods.

Integration of Cognitive, Emotional, and Volitional Processes

Looking more closely at the human psyche, we should consider the integration of cognitive, emotional, and volitional (regulatory) processes. Traditionally, memory is seen as part of cognitive processes, but why is it only classified as such? Standard classifications show that memory processes extend beyond just cognitive structures. Memory can be divided into visual, verbal-logical, emotional, and motor types. Visual and verbal-logical memory relate to cognitive processes at various levels, from sensory to conceptual thinking. Emotional and motor memory, however, belong to emotional and volitional processes. Thus, mnemonic processes are part of the broader set of cognitive, emotional, and volitional processes.

In all definitions, memory is the retention and reproduction of experience, which is fundamental and includes remembering, storing, recalling, and forgetting. Experience itself includes not only cognitive but also emotional and volitional aspects.

Memory as an Information Process

It’s clear that memory is not exclusive to biological systems—machine memory is a reality. In some ways, modern machine memory theory has advanced further than neurophysiological and psychological theories. Viewing memory as an information process—transmitting information through a temporal channel—allows us to apply information theory to human memory analysis. Not only quantitative measures but also the structure of information, such as encoding and decoding, have been invaluable in memory research.

Applying information theory principles to all types and levels of memory processes, including psychological ones, is not only possible but justified—perhaps more so than applying them to other mental processes. When we receive sensory information (stimuli), we focus on what matters most and transfer it to memory, effectively encoding it. The stimulus is not stored as an exact copy but as a sequence of signs. The more complex the stimulus, the more complex and varied its encoding, requiring attention to all its characteristics.

If memory is a psychological process of transmitting information through time, then further development of information theory is needed for all forms of memory, including psychological memory. Is it enough to use only general principles of information organization to reveal the specifics of memory as a psychological phenomenon? The definition of memory as the recording, storage, and reproduction of past experience, with minor changes, applies to any form of memory, including machine memory.

Importantly, the general principles of machine and human memory help reveal their specific differences, while also leveling the distinctions between different types of memory, potentially overlooking the uniqueness of memory as a psychological process. For example, recalling secondary images from memory is not just a process but a dynamic transition from a general code level to present psychological existence. Both primary and secondary images contain original spatial-temporal components, involving working memory, without which a mental image is impossible.

Secondary images should be considered not only within cognitive processes but also emotional and volitional ones. In the structure of cognitive processes, they occupy an intermediate position between visual and conceptual levels.

So, what is the role of memory in the overall system of cognitive processes that form intelligence, especially its connection to thinking as the highest level of intelligence?

The Modern Psychological Level of Memory Processes

The overall function of memory relates to the interaction of different components of experience, occurring at the modern psychological level of memory processes, not just at the level of long-term storage of static codes. This primarily refers to short-term and working memory, or the inclusion of memory processes in the very dynamics of thought, integrating separate components into coherent structures and integrating various cognitive processes into the overall system of intelligence.