ABSTRACT
Working memory is assumed to comprise an attentional coordinating system known as the Central Executive aided by a number of subsidiary slave systems of which two are illustrated, namely the Visuo-spatial Sketchpad, which is used for setting up and manipulating visual images, and the Articulatory Loop, a system that holds and utilizes inner speech. The Ebbinghaus tradition played an important role in the development of the psychology of memory, but it has the weakness that it tends to concentrate too heavily on simplified and apparently soluble problems, and to neglect the richness of memory in the world at large. The capacity to recollect events from one’s earlier life is termed autobiographical memory. Memories are systems for storing information, and as such are required to do three things: to take in the necessary information, to store it, and to retrieve it at the appropriate time.
