acts as an attention sensory store. it channels information to the three component processes: the phonological loop, the visuo-spatial sketchpad, and the episodic buffer. the phonological loop stores auditory information by silently rehearsing sounds or words in a continuous loop: the articulatory process (for example the repetition of a telephone number over and over again). a short list of data is easier to remember. the phonological loop is occasionally disrupted. irrelevant speech or background noise can impede the phonological loop. articulatory suppression can also confuse encoding and words that sound similar can be switched or misremembered through the phonological similarity effect. the phonological loop also has a limit to how much it can hold at once which means that it is easier to remember a lot of short words rather than a lot of long words, according to the word length effect. the visuospatial sketchpad stores visual and spatial information. it is engaged when performing spatial tasks (such as judging distances) or visual ones (such as counting the windows on a house or imagining images). those with aphantasia will not be able to engage the visuospatial sketchpad. the episodic buffer is dedicated to linking information across domains to form integrated units of visual, spatial, and verbal information and chronological ordering (e.g., the memory of a story or a movie scene). the episodic buffer is also assumed to have links to long-term memory and semantical meaning. the working memory model explains many practical observations, such as why it is easier to do two different tasks (one verbal and one visual) than two similar tasks (e.g., two visual), and the aforementioned word-length effect. working memory is also the premise for what allows us to do everyday activities involving thought. it is the section of memory where we carry out thought processes and use them to learn and reason about topics. types researchers distinguish between recognition and recall memory. recognition memory tasks require individuals to indicate whether they have encountered a stimulus (such as a picture or a word) before. recall memory tasks require participants to retrieve previously learned information. for example, individuals might be asked to produce a series of actions they have seen before or to say a list of words they have heard before. by information type topographical memory involves the ability to orient oneself in space, to recognize and follow an itinerary, or to recognize familiar places. getting lost when traveling alone is an example of the failure of topographic memory. flashbulb memories are clear episodic memories of unique and highly emotional events. people remembering where they were or what they were doing when they first heard the news of president kennedy's assassination, the sydney siege or of 9/11 are examples of flashbulb memories. anderson (1976) divides long-term memory into declarative (explicit) and procedural (implicit) memories. declarative declarative memory requires conscious recall, in that some conscious process must call back the information. it is sometimes called explicit memory, since it consists of information that is explicitly stored and retrieved. declarative memory can be further sub-divided into semantic memory, concerning principles and facts taken independent of context; and episodic memory, concerning information specific to a particular context, such as a time and place. semantic memory allows the encoding of abstract knowledge about the world, such as "paris is the capital of france". episodic memory, on the other hand, is used for more personal memories, such as the sensations, emotions, and personal associations of a particular place or time. episodic memories often reflect the "firsts" in life such as a first kiss, first day of school or first time winning a championship. these are key events in one's life that can be remembered clearly. research suggests that declarative memory is supported by several functions of the medial temporal lobe system which includes the hippocampus. autobiographical memory – memory for particular events within one's own life – is generally viewed as either equivalent to, or a subset of, episodic memory. visual memory is part of memory preserving some characteristics of our senses pertaining to visual experience. one is able to place in memory information that resembles objects, places, animals or people in sort of a mental image. visual memory can result in priming and it is assumed some kind of perceptual representational system underlies this phenomenon. procedural in contrast, procedural memory (or implicit memory) is not based on the conscious recall of information, but on implicit learning. it can best be summarized as remembering how to do something. procedural memory is primarily used in learning motor skills and can be considered a subset of implicit memory. it is revealed when one does better in a given task due only to repetition – no new explicit memories have been formed, but one is unconsciously accessing aspects of those previous experiences. procedural memory involved in motor learning depends on the cerebellum and basal ganglia. a characteristic of procedural memory is that the things remembered are automatically translated into actions, and thus sometimes difficult to describe. some examples of procedural memory include the ability to ride a bike or tie shoelaces. by temporal direction another major way to distinguish different memory functions is whether the content to be remembered is in the past, retrospective memory, or in the future, prospective memory. john meacham introduced this distinction in a paper presented at the 1975 american psychological association annual meeting and subsequently included by ulric neisser in his 1982 edited volume, memory observed: remembering in natural contexts. thus, retrospective memory as a category includes semantic, episodic and autobiographical memory. in contrast, prospective memory is memory for future intentions, or remembering to remember (winograd, 1988). prospective memory can be further broken down into event- and time-based prospective remembering. time-based prospective memories are triggered by a time-cue, such as going to the doctor (action) at 4pm (cue). event-based prospective memories are intentions triggered by cues, such as remembering to post a letter (action) after seeing a mailbox (cue). cues do not need to be related to the action (as the mailbox/letter example), and lists, sticky-notes, knotted handkerchiefs, or string around the finger all exemplify cues that people use as strategies to enhance prospective memory. study techniques to assess infants infants do not have the language ability to report on their memories and so verbal reports cannot be used to assess very young children's memory. throughout the years, however, researchers have adapted and developed a number of measures for assessing both infants' recognition memory and their recall memory. habituation and operant conditioning techniques have been used to assess infants' recognition memory and the deferred and elicited imitation techniques have been used to assess infants' recall memory. techniques used to assess infants' recognition memory include the following: visual paired comparison procedure (relies on habituation): infants are first presented with pairs of visual stimuli, such as two black-and-white photos of human faces, for a fixed amount of time; then, after being familiarized with the two photos, they are presented with the "familiar" photo and a new photo. the time spent looking at each photo is recorded. looking longer at the new photo indicates that they remember the "familiar" one. studies using this procedure have found that 5- to 6-month-olds can retain information for as long as fourteen days. operant conditioning technique: infants are placed in a crib and a ribbon that is connected to a mobile overhead is tied to one of their feet. infants notice that when they kick their foot the mobile moves – the rate of kicking increases dramatically within minutes. studies using this technique have revealed that infants' memory substantially improves over the first 18-months. whereas 2- to 3-month-olds can retain an operant response (such as activating the mobile by kicking their foot) for a week, 6-month-olds can retain it for two weeks, and 18-month-olds can retain a similar operant response for as long as 13 weeks. techniques used to assess infants' recall memory include the following: deferred imitation technique: an experimenter shows infants a unique sequence of actions (such as using a stick to push a button on a box) and then, after a delay, asks the infants to imitate the actions. studies using deferred imitation have shown that 14-month-olds' memories for the sequence of actions can last for as long as four months. elicited imitation technique: is very similar to the deferred imitation technique; the difference is that infants are allowed to imitate the actions before the delay. studies using the elicited imitation technique have shown that 20-month-olds can recall the action sequences twelve months later. to assess children and older adults researchers use a variety of tasks to assess older children and adults' memory. some examples are: paired associate learning – when one learns to associate one specific word with another. for example, when given a word such as "safe" one must learn to say another specific word, such as "green". this is stimulus and response. free recall – during this task a subject would be asked to study a list of words and then later they will be asked to recall or write down as many words that they can remember, similar to free response questions. earlier items are affected by retroactive interference (ri), which means the longer the list, the greater the interference, and the less likelihood that they are recalled. on the other hand, items that have been presented lastly suffer little ri, but suffer a great deal from proactive interference (pi), which means the longer the delay in recall, the more likely that the items will be lost. cued recall – one is given a significant hints to help retrieve information that has been previously encoded into the person's memory; typically this can involve a word relating to the information being asked to remember. this is similar to fill in the blank assessments used in classrooms. recognition – subjects are asked to remember a list of words or pictures, after which point they are asked to identify the previously presented words or pictures from among a list of alternatives that were not presented in the original list. this is similar to multiple choice assessments. detection paradigm – individuals are shown a number of objects and color samples during a certain period of time. they are then tested on their visual ability to remember as much as they can by looking at testers and pointing out whether the testers are similar to the sample, or if any change is present. savings method – compares the speed of originally learning to the speed of relearning it. the amount of time saved measures memory. implicit-memory tasks – information is drawn from memory without conscious realization. failures the garden of oblivion, illustration by ephraim moses lilien. transience – memories degrade with the passing of time. this occurs in the storage stage of memory, after the information has been stored and before it is retrieved. this can happen in sensory, short-term, and long-term storage. it follows a general pattern where the information is rapidly forgotten during the first couple of days or years, followed by small losses in later days or years. absent-mindedness – memory failure due to the lack of attention. attention plays a key role in storing information into long-term memory; without proper attention, the information might not be stored, making it impossible to be retrieved later. physiology brain areas involved in the neuroanatomy of memory such as the hippocampus, the amygdala, the striatum, or the mammillary bodies are thought to be involved in specific types of memory. for example, the hippocampus is believed to be involved in spatial learning and declarative learning, while the amygdala is thought to be involved in emotional memory. damage to certain areas in patients and animal models and subsequent memory deficits is a primary source of information. however, rather than implicating a specific area, it could be that damage to adjacent areas, or to a pathway traveling through the area is actually responsible for the observed deficit. further, it is not sufficient to describe memory, and its counterpart, learning, as solely dependent on specific brain regions. learning and memory are usually attributed to changes in neuronal synapses, thought to be mediated by long-term potentiation and long-term depression. in general, the more emotionally charged an event or experience is, the better it is remembered; this phenomenon is