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Alan Baddeley: 3 ideas worth knowing

3 ideas from Alan Baddeley, each explained in a minute and credited to the original work. Free on Savvy.

• Scuba divers remembered words better underwater if they'd learned them underwater

  In a 1975 experiment, divers memorised word lists either on a beach or several metres underwater, then were tested for recall in both environments. Recall was consistently better w…

  — Duncan Godden and Alan Baddeley, Context-dependent memory in two natural environments: on land and underwater

• Your working memory runs on two separate channels, not one

  In 1974 Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch replaced the idea of a single short-term memory store with a model built from separate parts: an inner voice for sounds and words, an inner e…

  — Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch, Working Memory (in The Psychology of Learning and Motivation, Vol. 8)

• Scuba divers remember word lists best back in the exact place they learned them

  In a 1975 study, divers memorized word lists either on a beach or fully submerged underwater, then recalled them in either the same or the opposite setting. Recall was consistently…

  — Duncan Godden and Alan Baddeley, Context-dependent memory in two natural environments: on land and underwater

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