Chapter 8: Memory

The primary effect is due to transfer of early words to long-term memory and the regency effect is due to short-term memory.

According to the three-component model, why do primary and recency effects occur?

Memory loss for early experience although some people can partially recall major events. Hypothesis: 1. brain regions encoding long-term episodic memories are still immature in the first years after birth 2. We do not encode our earliest experiences deeply and fail to form rich retrieval cues for them 3. Because infants lack clear self-concept they do not have a personal frame of reference around which to organize rich memories.

Describe the nature and possible causes of infantile amnesia.

This Amnesia refers to memory loss for events that occur after the initial onset of amnesia. Removal of much of the hippocampus for H.M robbed him of the ability to consciously remember new experiences and facts. Can also be produced by Korsakoffs syndrome which can result from chronic alcoholism.

Describe the nature and some possible causes of anterograde amnesia.

-Retrograde amnesia represents memory loss for events that occurred prior to the onset of amnesia. A football player who is knocked out in a concussion, regains consciousness and cannot remember the events before getting hit is experiencing retrograde amnesia.

Describe the nature and some possible causes of retrograde amnesia.

By rehearsing information we can extend its duration in short-term memory indefinitely. This occurs when you look up a telephone number and keep saying it to yourself. This is maintenance Rehearsal. Elaborative rehearsal involves focusing on the meaning of information or relating it to other things that we already know. Elaborative rehearsal is more effective in transferring information into long-term memory.

Differ between Maintenance rehearsal and elaborative rehearsal.

Dementia refers to impaired memory and other cognitive deficits that accompany brain degeneration and interfere with normal brain functioning. Alzheimers is a progressive brain disorder than is the most common cause of dementia.

Differentiate between Dementia and Alzhemiers.

Learning new information involves, Effortful processing, encoding that is initiated intentionally and requires conscious attention. E.g) rehearsing, taking notes and making lists. Automatic processing involves encoding that occurs without intention and requires minimal attention. - Knowing that a specific diagram was on the upper left page of a note.

Distinguish between effortful and automatic processing.

Declarative memory involves factual knowledge, and includes two subcategories. 1. Episodic memory is our store of factual knowledge concerning personal experiences: when, where and what happened in the episodes of our lives. i.e) i ate pizza last night. 2. Semantic memory represents general factual knowledge about the world and language, including memory for words and concepts. Episodic and semantic memories are called declarative because to demonstrate our knowledge we have to declare it.

Explain declarative memory

Misinformation effects can also occur because of source confusion. Source confusion is our tendency to recall something or recognize it as familiar, but to forget where we encountered it. E.g) a eyewitness looks through a series of mugshots and reports that none of the individuals is the perpetrator. Several days later, the eyewitness is brought back to view a lineup and is asked to identify who committed the crime.

Explain how source confusion contributes to misinformation effects

Reflected in skills and actions. One component of procedural memory consists of skills that are expressed by "doing things" in particular situations, such as typing, riding a bicycle, or playing a musical instrument. Classical conditioning responses also reflect procedural memory.

Explain procedural memory

The more deeply we process information the better it will be remembered. E.g) Semantic encoding involves the deepest processing because it requires us to focus on the meaning of the information.

Explain the concept of "depth of processing"

Priming refers to the activation of one concept (or one unit of information) by another. Thus "fire engine" primes the node for "Red" making it more likely that our memory for this colour will be accessed.

Explain the concept of Priming.

One group of theories proposes that memory can be represented as an associative network, a mass network of associate ideas and concepts. When people think about a concept, such as a fire engine, there is a spreading activation of related concepts throughout the network. E.g) when you think of a fire engine related concepts such as truck, fire and red should be partially activated as well.

Explain the concepts of associative networks.

The encoding principle states that memories are enhanced when conditions present during retrieval match those present during encoding.

Explain the encoding specificity principle.

The misinformation effect refers to the distortion of a memory by misleading post-event information and has been demonstrated in numerous studies. Mistaken eyewitness identification accounts for the source of more wrongful convictions in both Canada and the US than all other sources.

Explain the misinformation effect in relation to eyewitness testimony.

Barely told a native american story to english residents and asked them to recall it after 20 hours, behaviours typical of their lives were incorporated into the story: Memory construction. University students look at photographs of a main object they draw the picture as being a wider angle that it really was. Boundary extension refers to remembering a scene has more expansive than it actually was.

How do Barletts research and studies of boundary extension illustrate memory construction?

Mnemonic devices are any types of memory aids. Hierarchies and chunking are types of mnemonic devices. Mnemonic devices do not reduce the amount of raw information that you have to encode into memory. Rather, they reorganize information into more meaningful units and provide extra cues to help you retrieve information from long-term memory.

How do Mnemonic devices enhance memory?

In an neural network each concept is represented by a particular pattern or set or nodes that becomes activated simultaneously. Often called parallel distributed processing models. When node 4 is activated in parallel with nodes 9 and 42, the concept "red" might come to mind. But when node 4 is activated with nodes 75 and 690 another concept might enter our thoughts. There is no single node for "red" or "fire engine"

How do neural network models differ from associative network models?

Allan paivios dual coding theory. Information is stored in long-term memory in two forms: verbal codes and non-verbal codes. This enhances memory because the odds improve that at least one of the codes will be available later to support recall. Thus two codes are better than one. Abstract concepts are easier to encode semantically than visually.

How does visual imagery enhance memory?

Maintenance rehearsal is more effective for keeping information in short-term, working memory and may help transfer some information into long-term memory but it is an inefficient method for brining about long-term transfer. Elaborative rehearsal focuses on the meaning of information and thus involves deeper processing that maintenance rehearsal and should be more effective in transferring information into long-term memory.

How effectively do maintenance and elaborative rehearsal process information into long-term memory?

Many memory failures result not from forgetting the information but from failing to encode the information in the first place.

Identify encoding processes that have been hypothesized to contribute to forgetting.

1. Auditory working memory (phonological loop) 2. Visual-spatial working memory (visuospatial sketchpad) 3. The episodic buffer provides temporary storage space.

Identify three components of working memory.

Acquiring expert knowledge can be viewed as a process of developing schemas- mental frameworks- that help to encode information into meaningful patterns.

In what sense are schemas and expert knowledge related?

The mind serves as a processing system that encodes, stores and retrieves infromation.

In what ways is memory like an information-processing system?

Explicit memories involve conscious or intention memory retrieval when when you consciously recognize or recall something. E.g) Recognition on a Multiple choice test. - Recall which involves spontaneous memory retrieval. E.g) essays, short-answers Implicit memories occur when memory influences our behaviour without conscious awareness. E.g ) riding a bike, driving. We can measure this by giving someone three words and then a period of time later giving them fill in the blanks where these words are suggested. Those who have seen the words before will write them subconsciously.

What are explicit and implicit memories? Describe ways to measure them.

Flashbob memories are recollections that seem so vivid and clear that we can picture them as if they were a snapshot of a moment in time. They are most likely to occur for distinctive, positive or negative events that evoke strong emotional reactions. Not always accurate- people after princess Dianas crash swore they saw a video tape of the crash happening... no such tape exists.

What are flashbob memories and do they always provide an accurate picture? Describe some evidence.

Once information leaves sensory memory it must be represented by some type of code if it is to be retained in short-term and eventually long-term memory. Such mental representations, or memory codes, can have various forms. Visual encoding, phonological encoding or semantic encoding.

What are memory codes?

1. Proactive interference occurs when material learned in the past interfere with recall of newer material. i.e) giving someone your old phone number instead of you new one. 2. Retroactive interference occurs in the opposite direction and refers to newly acquired information interfering with the ability to recall information learned at an earlier time.

What are the two major types of interference?

Forgetting curve shows a rapid loss of memory for nonsense syllables at first, then a more gradual decline. The rapid decline is probably due to the meaningless nature of nonsense syllables.

What is Ebbinghaus forgetting curve and what factors contribute to his rapid, substantial forgetting?

Iconic memory refers to our visual sensory register. Spelling used

What is Iconic memory and How did spelling asses the duration of Iconic Memory?

A retrieval cue is any stimulus, that stimulates the activation of information stored in long-term memory. "Have you seen sally today"... Sally is the retrieval cue.

What is a retrieval cue?

A schema is a mental framework- an organized pattern of thought about some aspects of the world- such as a class of people, event, situations or objects. Schemas create a perceptual set, which is a readiness to perceive- to organize and interpret- information in a certain way.

What is a schema? Explain how they influence encoding.

Chunking involves combining individual items into larger units of meaning and is a great aid recall. I.e B I R C Y K A E U Q S A S A W T I "It was a squeaky crib"

What is chunking?

Applying the encoding specificity principle to external cues leads us to context-dependant memory. It is easier to remember something in the same environment in which it was acquired. Thus, going to a high school may trigger memories of friends, teachers etc.

What is context-dependent memory?

The enduring increase in synaptic strength.

What is long term potential?

We tend to recall information or events that are congruent with our current mood. When we are happy we are more likely to remember positive events. Vice versa.

What is mood-congurent recall?

Concerns remembering to perform an activity in the future. Frontal lobes seem to be directly invovled

What is prospective memory?

Sensory memory holds incoming information just long enough for it to be recognized. It is composed of different subsystems called sensory registers, which are the initial information processors.

What is sensory memory?

Proposes that are ability to retrieve information is greater when our internal state at the time of retrieval matches our original state during learning. Material learned at rest is better recalled at rest. I.e Swedish jogger.

What is state-dependent memory?

-Proposes that with time and disuse the physical memory trace in the nervous system fades away.

What is the decay theory?

- We forget information because other items in long-term memory impair our ability to retrieve it.

What is the interference theory?

A greek effective and well known memory technique. To remember a list of items or concepts, take an imaginary stroll through this environment and from an image linking each place with an item or concept.

What is the method of loci?

The serial position effects means that recall is influenced by a words position in a series of items. The primary effect reflects the superior recall of early words and the recency effect represents the superior recall of the most recent words.

What is the serial position effect? Under what conditions do primary and recency effects occur?

The hippocampus and its adjacent tissue help to encode and retrieve long-term declarative memories. Helps to gradually convert short-term memories into permanent ones.

What major roles does the hippocampus play in memory?

The amygdala encodes emotionally arousing aspects of stimuli and plays an important role in helping us form long-term memories for events that stir our emotions.

What role does the amygdala play in memory?

The cerebellum plays an important role in forming procedural memories.

What role does the cerebellum play in memory?

The brains major sensory relay station. Damage can impair the encoding of new memories and the retrieval of old ones.

What role does the thalamus play in memory?

Hierarchies take advantage of the principle that memory is enhanced by associations between concepts. Enhances understanding of how these diverse elements are related and as we proceed from top to bottom, each category can serve as a cue that triggers our memory for the associated items below it.

Why do hierarchies enhance memory?

Short term-memory is too passive and sequential. Working memory refers to a mental work space that actively and simultaneously processes different types of information and supports other cognitive functions, such as problem solving, and planning and interacts with long-term memory.

Why do researchers refer to short-term memory as working memory?

It widens the information-processing bottleneck caused by the limited capacity of short-term memory.

Why does chunking enhance memory?

Generating our own associations involves deeper more elaborative rehearsal than does being presented with someone else. Similarly, generating three associations involves deeper processing than thinking of only one.

Why does having multiple, self-generated retrieval cues enhance recall?