Short-Term vs Long-Term Memory

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Short-Term Memory

Short-term memory (STM) is the point of processing sensory memory. This then determines whether information is moved into long-term memory or not.

Short-term memory (STM)

Short-term memory (STM) is a temporary storage system that processes incoming sensory memory.
Short-term memory takes information from sensory memory and sometimes connects that memory to something already in long-term memory.
Short-term memory storage lasts about 20 seconds (estimated to be between 18 and 30 seconds).

Information processing in STM

Think of short-term memory as the information you have displayed on your computer screen - a document, a spreadsheet, or a web page.
Information in short-term memory is stored in long-term memory if you save it to your computer's hard drive, or it is discarded if you close the webpage or delete the document.
Rehearsal is the conscious repetition of information that you want to remember. This feels like repeating something over & over in your head.
This step of rehearsal may help to move information from STM into long-term memory - which is called memory consolidation.

STM capacity

In his research on the capacity of memory, George Miller (1956) found that most people can retain about seven items in STM.
Some remember five, some nine, so he called the capacity of STM seven plus or minus two.
Some factors affect our STM. For example, numbers recall is better than letters, and acoustic coding tends to be better than visual coding.

Summary

Duration: 20 seconds.
Capacity: seven +/- two items.
Coding: primarily acoustic.

Long-term memory is like the brain's hard-drive. It is theorised to have an unlimited capacity. Most of the time, information can be retained and moved back into short-term memory - but you may need a prompt.

Long-term memory (LTM)

Long-term memory (LTM) is the continuous storage of information.
Unlike short-term memory, the storage capacity of LTM has no limits.
LTM contains everything that you can remember, even if it happened 2 minutes ago, weeks ago or years ago.

Information processing in LTM

Sticking with the computer analogy, the information in your LTM would be like the information you have saved on the hard drive.
Information stored on the hard drive isn't visible on your computer screen (or in your immediate short-term memory), but you could probably access (or remember) the information if you wanted to.

Strength of long-term memories

Not all long-term memories are remembered equally strongly. It can be harder to remember some memories and prompts (or memory cues) can make it easier to access a memory.
For example, you might easily recall a fact - “What is the capital of the United States?” - or a procedure - “How do you ride a bike?” - but you might struggle to recall the name of the restaurant you had dinner in when you were on holiday in France last summer.
- However, a prompt or memory cue about the owner of the restaurant or the first word of the name may help you recall the restaurant's name.