Short-term memory as an activation-based process: old arguments, new models

Speaker: Prof Eddy Davelaar

Summary

What if short-term memory is not a separate memory system at all? We have spent decades trying to explain the capacity of a memory store that may not exist as a separate store in the first place. Cognitive theorists have debated whether short-term memory depends on specialised stores, sustained neural activity, or the temporary activation of representations already embedded in long-term memory. These are not new discussions, but recent developments in artificial intelligence have brought the surrounding arguments into sharper focus.

In this talk, I revisit the idea that short-term memory is fundamentally a dynamic process rather than a dedicated storage system. I will examine how activation-based models can account for some of the most familiar characteristics in the STM literature. I consider the contribution of generative AI models, particularly as "STM" emerges from the dynamics of interacting representations instead of being explicitly built into the architecture.

These developments raise some debatable questions. At one end, do we really need a separate short-term memory store? Is persistent neural activity necessary for remembering? At the other end, have some of the classic distinctions between short-term memory, working memory, and long-term memory become more of a theoretical obstacle than an explanation? The debates are not settled, but I argue that some of our oldest ideas about memory may provide a more productive starting point for understanding cognition than many of the distinctions we continue to teach.

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