Modeling Grouping with Recursive Auto-Associative Memory

Sometimes humans have a need for storing long sequences of information in memory. Several experiments show that grouping the items in the sequence helps storing the sequence in auditory short-term memory. One architecture used by connectionist cognitive researchers when representing and processing sequences is Recursive Auto-Associative Memory. One of the aspects of it is that its capacity for storing sequences is limited, leading to that the longer the sequence the less likely it is that the entire sequence can be recalled; the deepest parts of the sequence are forgotten. Two experiments are performed to test if grouping affects storage in Recursive Auto-Associative Memories. We conclude that grouping affects the ability for storing sequences in Recursive AutoAssociative Memories much in the same way as it affects the human auditory short-term memory, i.e., using grouping increase the probability of that the sequence can be recalled correctly.