Question

Describe the stages of memory

Answer 1

Memory involves three stages namely encoding, storage and retrieval. The first stage of memory is the encoding stage. In this stage, the brain encodes or stores by accumulating information from the surrounding environment. The information is encoded either by acoustic (sound), semantic (meaning) or visual (picture). The storage stage as suggests by the name stores the information. They are stores in two main parts viz; short-term memory (STM) and long-term memory (LTM). STM stores information in the brain for a short period of time, whereas, LTM stores information for a long duration. The retrieval stage refers to retrieving the information stored in the storage stage. The degree to which a person can retrieve information depends on the storage of either STM and LTM.