Unit 3
Recognition
Identifying something that we have seen before from a pool of things (multiple choice questions)
decay forgetting
Neurons are used less and less, becoming weaker and weaker, leading us to forget
sensory memory
Temporary storage of everything our senses take in (.5-3 seconds)
anterograde amnesia
an inability to form new memories
retrograde amnesia
an inability to retrieve information from one's past
availability heuristic
judging a situation based on examples of similar situations that come to mind initially
Representative heuristic
judging the likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to represent, or match, particular prototypes
Interference forgetting
learning some items may disrupt retrieval of other information
serial position effect
our tendency to recall the last and first items in a list best
anchoring effect
fixating on initial information and ignoring subsequent information (normally in prices)
sentences stage
(6-10 yrs old)- implicit understanding and 80% of language learned already
telegraphic stage
2 word sentences, normally overgeneralized grammar (broken)
Cocktail party effect
Ability to concentrate on one voice amongst a crowd
encoding categories
Automatic, Effortful (shallow and deep processing)
language aquisition stages
Babbling Stage, HoloPhrastic, Telegraphic, Sentence
attention
Converting sensory memory into short-term memory
Forgetting categories
Decay, Interference, Amnesia
convergent thinking
Deciding what is the best idea or possibility in a problem (doing it!)
George Miller
Found that short term memory has the capacity of about 7 (+/- 2) items.
Fixation
Inability to view a problem from a different perspective; one way and one way only
Elizabeth Loftus
Memory is maleable; car crash (make it worse than it seems)
Explicit: episodic memory
Memory of personally experienced events
parallel processing
Processing many aspects of objects at the same time (motion, color, depth, etc...)
babbling stage
Random noises; random phonemes of home language
long-term potentiation
Recalling information over and over strengthens firing and synapses of neurons; remember more and better
Recall
Remembering without an option of answers (fill in blank questions)
maintenance rehearsal
Repeating info in order to lengthen time in Short-term memory
Effortful: deep processing
Requires learning; meaningful analysis-really thinking about it
Effortful: shallow processing
Requires learning; memorizing things w/o meaning
Syntax
Rules for arranging words effectively in a sentence
Morphemes
The smallest units of meaning in a language.
divergent thinking
Thinking about the number of possibilities or ideas in a given problem
elaboritive rehearsal
Transferring info into long-term memory; mnemonic devices are an example of this encoding (giving something meaning)
holophrastic stage
Whole ideas via one word, eg: "mama" for any woman
echoic memory
auditory sensory memory (2-4 seconds)
short-term memory
component of memory system that holds information for about 20 seconds
Chomsky's Language Acquisition Device
every child is born with the knowledge to acquire language and grammar rules
Long-term memory categories
explicit and implicit
Explicit: semantic memory
facts, rules, concepts, general knowledge
retroactive interference
new information interferes with old information
proactive interference
old information interferes with the new information
Implicit: procedural memory
retention without conscious recollection (such as skills)
Phonemes
smallest unit of sound
Implicit: priming memory
stimulus exposure affects responses to a later stimulus
tip of the tongue phenomenon
temporary inability to remember information; recall gets pieces, but not all
primacy effect
tendency to remember things at beginning of list
recency effect
tendency to remember things at the end of a list
selective attention
the ability to focus on only one stimulus from among all sensory input
Ebbinghaus forgetting curve
the course of forgetting is initially rapid, then levels off with time
functional fixedness
the tendency to perceive an item only in terms of its most common use
automatic processing
unconscious encoding of incidental information
iconic memory
visual sensory memory (0.25 seconds)