Chapter 8

James has suffered hippocampal damage from a near-fatal bus crash. He is not able to remember verbal information, but retains the ability to recall visual designs and locations. His damage is to the left _____.

hippocampus

The _____ is the neural center involved in processing explicit memories for storage.

hippocampus

Our unconscious capacity for learning how to do something is known as:

implicit memory.

One important reason that sleep is so important in remembering what you have studied is because during sleep, the brain organizes and _____ newly learned information for long-term memory.

consolidates

Oliver is trying to make an online purchase, but he doesn't have his credit card. He calls his wife, who reads the 16-digit credit card number to him. Unfortunately, Oliver cannot remember the number long enough to type it into the computer. This is because short-term memory is limited in _____ and capacity.

duration

Studying for your psychology test requires _____ processing. It takes attention and conscious work, but pays off with lasting and accessible memories.

effortful

One reason our memories fail is because of problems with information _____.

encoding

Our ability to recognize material can make us feel _____, which might lead to poorer performance on certain tests.

overconfident

Our tendency to recall the last and first items in a list is known as the serial _____ effect.

position

Research on memory construction reveals that memories:

reflect a person's biases and assumptions.

One way to test memory is to check the speed of _____ for things that we once learned but have since forgotten.

relearning

Which of the following is NOT a measure of retention?

retrieval

Darlene is trying to remember the name of a woman sitting next to her on the bus. She knows she met her at a party, and she is trying to remember which one. Darlene is able to imagine where the woman was seated at the party, as well as what she was eating. Darlene is using _____ to remember the woman's name.

retrieval cues

The happier Judie feels, the more readily she recalls experiences with former teachers who were warm and generous. This best illustrates that emotional states can be _____.

retrieval cues

While taking an American history exam, Marie was surprised and frustrated by her momentary inability to remember the name of the first president of the United States. Her difficulty most clearly illustrates:

retrieval failure.

_____ interference occurs when something you learn now interferes with your ability to recall something you learned earlier.

retroactive

In Richard Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin's three-stage processing model we record information in which order?

sensory memory, short-term memory, long-term memory

When learning occurs in the California sea slug, more of the neurotransmitter _____ is released at certain synapses.

serotonin

The retention of encoded information over time is called _____.

storage

One of your new patients claims to have been molested and discovered this after going to a hypnotherapist. You are skeptical because you know that hypnotized subjects incorporate _____ into their memories.

suggestions

_____ refers to our tendency to recall experiences that are consistent with our current mood. In other words, if you are in a bad mood, you will be more likely to have negative associations.

Mood-congruent memory

Some individuals have an amazing ability to remember things. For example, Russian journalist Solomon Shereshevskii could remember up to _____ digits or words.

70

When you recall an imagined event as something that you directly experienced, or something that really happened to you, you are best illustrating source _____.

amnesia

Our short-term recall is slightly better for random _____ than for random letters, which may have similar sounds.

digits

Professor Wallace studies memory in people who have had strokes. Professor Hansen studies people who claim to have clear memories of events that happened over three decades ago. Such research on the extremes of memory:

helps us to understand how memory works.

Research conducted by George Sperling showed that people have something akin to a fleeting photographic memory. This _____ provides a momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli, like a picture-image that lasts only a few tenths of a second.

iconic memory

When people repeatedly imagine nonexistent actions and events, they can inadvertently create false memories. In one experiment students were asked to repeatedly imagine breaking a toothpick. Following this, they were more likely to think they had actually broken a toothpick. This is known as:

imagination inflation

Six-year-old Fiona has no memory of a trip she took to the hospital when she was two years old, yet the rest of her family recalls what happened in vivid detail. Her inability to remember this event is known as _____ amnesia.

infantile

Our short-term recall is slightly better for random digits than for random _____, which may have similar sounds.

letters

When people are given subtle misleading information about a past event, they often misremember the true details surrounding the event. This is known as the _____ effect.

misinformation

When bits of information do not compete with each other, and actually facilitate memory, it is called:

positive transfer.

A fill-in-the-blank test is a good way to test _____.

recall

A multiple-choice test is a good way to test:

recognition

Imagine you have to pick the correct answer from a displayed list of options. This aspect of memory is known as _____.

recognition

Although Jordan cannot recall the exact words of a poem he heard recently, he clearly remembers the poem's meaning. This best illustrates the importance of:

semantic encoding.

The extensive rehearsal necessary to encode nonsense syllables best illustrates _____ processing.

effortful

_____ occurs when something you learn now interferes with your ability to recall something you learned earlier.

Retroactive interference

The most common response to a(n) _____ experience includes vivid and persistent memories.

traumatic

David Mitchell (2006) found that people who were shown a picture of an elephant for a couple of seconds _____ years earlier displayed a better ability for identification than a control group.

17

Imagine a study in which participants are shown 2,000 slides of houses and storefronts, each for only 10 seconds. Later, these same participants are shown 300 of the original slides paired with slides they have not seen before. According to research, these participants would be able to recognize _____ percent of the slides they had seen before.

90

Participants in a study conducted by Ralph Haber were shown more than 2,500 slides of faces and places for only 10 seconds each. Later, they were shown 280 of these slides, paired with an unseen slide. The participants were able to recognize _____ percent of the slides they had seen before.

90

_____ was to the study of memory as _____ was to the study of conditioning.

Hermann Ebbinghaus; Ivan Pavlov

_____ memory refers to retention of information that is independent of conscious recollection, whereas _____ refers to memory for facts and experiences.

Implicit; explicit

Larry has just graduated from college and is going on his first job interview. He has learned that there are 10 other applicants for the job. Because of information on the serial position effect that he learned in his psychology class, Larry asks to be either the first or the last candidate interviewed. Why?

The serial position effect predicts that either the first or the last job applicant interviewed will be remembered better than the applicants interviewed in the middle of the group.

He said, "If we remembered everything, we should on most occasions be as ill off as if we remembered nothing."

William James