psy 3361 (exam 2)

working memory

Baddely and Hitch; the brief, immediate memory for the limited amount of material a person currently processes; actively coordinates ongoing mental activity

episodic memory

declarative; memory for events that happened personally (e.g. your birthday party from a week ago); “snapshot” in time

semantic memory

organized knowledge about the world or other factual information (e.g. knowing the state capitols)

procedural memory

knowledge about how to do something (e.g. knowing how to tie your shoes)

encoding

processing information and representing it in one’s memory

inattention

causes encoding to fail

retrieval

locating information in long-term storage and accessing it

interference

causes retrieval to fail

levels of processing approach

Craik and Lockhart; deep and meaningful processing of information leads to more accurate recall

distinctiveness

levels of processing; ensuring a stimulus is different from other memory traces

elaboration

levels of processing; emphasizes the meaning of a particular concept by relating it to concepts already mastered

self-reference effect

information is better remembered if it is related back to oneself, encourages deeper processing

deeper processing requires…

more cues + meaningful stimulus in order for retrieval to work

T.B. Rogers and coauthors’ study

participants in this study were asked to process words according to specific conditions; those that used self-reference to process said words had the highest recall

Symons and Johnson’s study

this study was found using meta-analysis; confirmed that recall is highest when using the self-reference method

encoding specificity principle

recall is often better if the context during encoding is similar to the context during retrieval (e.g. Baddeley scuba-diving study; taking a test in the room you learned the material in)

encoding specificity is most likely to occur when…

memory tasks involve recall, examine events from the past, or use real life incidents

emotion

reaction to a certain stimulus

mood

generalized, long lasting experience of a variety of stimuli

the emotional nature of stimuli affects ______.

long term memory (the more emotional something is, the more it is remembered)

Pollyanna principle

pleasant memories are processed better than non-pleasant memories

positivity effect

Walker; people view negative experiences more positively as time goes on

cognitive interview

Geiselman; people remember better when they have many paths to retrieval

the cognitive interview has two parts:

mentally reinstate everything you can remember about an event (both environmental and personal); recount the event in different orders/perspectives

declarative (explicit) memory

best described in words

autobiographical memory

long-term memory of events related to oneself/life

nondeclarative (implicit) memory

long-term memory better demonstrated than described

implicit memory is integrated by the _____.

basal ganglia

who was patient H.M.?

a man who had 2/3rds of his hippocampi removed because of seizures; studied by Brenda Milner; was consequently unable to form new memories (anterograde amnesia) or recall old ones (retrograde amnesia); working memory stayed mostly intact

short term memories do not require the _____ in order to form.

hippocampus

how does the hippocampus impact memory?

it is necessary to form long-term memories/for information to reach long term storage

explicit memory task

participants are instructed to remember information that will later be recalled intentionally

implicit memory task

participants see material that will facilitate the performance of a later cognitive task

repetition priming task

recent exposure to a word increases chances of a person thinking of said word when given a non-specific cue

dissociation

an outcome or variable has large effects on one test but not the other; a variable has opposite effects on either test

Kristin Mitte’s study

a study testing memory patterns in people with anxiety disorders; found that anxious people remember distressing words more accurately than those without anxiety (perhaps due to better encoding)

Hruska and colleagues’ study

a study using fMRI on the brains of newbie and professional doctors reading about clinical cases; found that areas of the prefrontal cortex (used for working memory) were more active in the newbies than the experts (experts had more in long-term storage)

schema

general knowledge or expectation retrieved from past experiences; the “gist” of a concept, flexible and changes as knowledge is acquired

consistency bias

occurs during recall’ the tendency to exaggerate the consistence between past feelings and present beliefs; makes people’s stories consistent w their schemas

Goodwin et al. study

a study that found intoxicated subjects recalled stuff they had learned while drunk better when intoxicated than when they were sober; the state of the individual while learning affected recall; validates the encoding specificity effect (aka state dependency effect)

source monitoring

the process of trying to identify the origins of a certain memory

Marsh and colleagues’ study

a study that asked college students to discuss open ended questions on a topic; most students rightfully identified ideas discussed that weren’t theirs when asked a week later

reality monitoring

the attempt to identify whether an event really occurred or if it was only imagined

flashbulb memory

memory for the circumstances in which one first learned about a very surprising and emotionally arousing event

Talacrio and Ruben’s study

a study conducted on flashbulb memory after 9/11; students were asked to remember specific details they remembered about the tragedy; over time, the consistency for the 9/11 memories recounted by the students decreased; demonstrates that flashbulb memories are not immune to distortion/aren’t perpetually accurate

Neisser and Libby’s study

there is a metacognitive belief in people’s confidence in their ability to remember the specificities of an event (ppl tend to be overconfident)

Brown and Kulik’s six reliable characteristics of flashbulb memory

1). place

2.) ongoing event that was interrupted at the time

3.) the person delivering the news

4.) one’s own feelings about the event that just occurred

5.) the emotions of others, and;

6.) the aftermath of the situation

two researchers who claimed memories are not photographically accurate/photographic memory is (mostly) myth

Brown and Kulik

misinformation effect

inaccurate information conflicting with a true memory

Loftus and colleagues’ study

a study that found feeding people inaccuracies might cause them to mis-recall them as true later

proactive interference

struggling to recall new material because older material keeps getting in the way

retroactive interference

struggling to recall old information because new material keeps getting in the way

constructivist approach

in long-term memory, knowledge is constructed by integrating previously known information w new information (emphasized by the misinformation effect)

recovered memory perspective

belief that people can repress memories due to trauma and later rediscover them

false memory perspective

most “recovered” memories are actually false or never happened

Schacter’s seven sins of forgetting memory

1.) transience (loss of information overtime)

2.) absentmindedness) encoding failure)

3.) blocking (temporary inaccess to stored info)

4.) misattribution (correct content paired with an incorrect source)

5.) suggestibility (incorporating misleading information into memory, creating distortions or false memories)

6.) bias (distortion of memories by present beliefs)

7). persistence (intrusive and unwanted memories that keep returning)

Schacter found the brain mechanisms used to remember things are also used to _____ events.

predict

memory strategy

mental activities that improve encoding and retrieval

absentmindedness

failure to encode due to distraction or inattention during encoding or retrieval

According to Craik and Lockhart, deeper levels of processing requires _____ and _____.

elaboration, distinctiveness

elaboration

emphasizing the meaning of a concept and relating it to prior knowledge

total-time hypothesis

the amount of information a person learns depends on the total amount of time they used to learn it (longer = better); isn’t always true (quality of time spent > duration of time spent)

distributed practice (spacing) effect

material is better remembered if learning it is spread over time

massed learning (cramming)

learning material in a short period of time, generally ineffective

Batrick and Phelps’s study

a study that had participants learn Spanish-English word pairs; found that participants whose language study sessions were spaced out retained much more information than the other participants

desirable difficulties

Robert Bjork; a somewhat challenging (but not too difficult) learning situation, helps increase long-term recall

testing effect

the act of taking a test helps to boost long term memory recall

Carpenter and colleagues’ study

a study testing memory for learned information; found that participants whose most recent activity has been taking a practice test outperformed participants in the “study only” control group (when a real test was assigned); verified the testing effect

Roediger and Karpicke’s study

a study where students were tasked to read short essays and take a test over the essay material; students whose last activity had been taking a practice test and had a long delay between did much better on the cumulative exam for the essay than those who did not; demonstrated the testing effect

Cassady’s study

a study that demonstrated how anxiety interferes with retrieval and understanding material; participants read a textbook and completed an anxiety self-test before taking a multiple-choice exam on said textbook material; people who scored high on the anxiety self-test had lower scores on the multiple-choice test (and made more errors)

mnemonics

mental strategies designed to improve memory

two types of mnemonics

mental imagery and organization

mental imagery

mnemonic strategy; mental representations of stimuli when said stimuli are not physically present

organization

mnemonic strategy; uses deep processing to sort items being learned into categories for more efficient retrieval

Bower and Winzenz’s study

a study documenting the use of mental imagery to better recall word-pairs; participants who used mental imagery of the two paired words interacting with each other maintained better recall

keyword method

identifying a word that sounds similar to a new word that is trying to be learned

method of loci

placing mental imagery in familiar locations; helps with recall

the four types organizational mnemonic strategies

1.) chunking

2.) hierarchy

3.) first letter technique

4.) narrative technique

chunking

combining several small units of information to create larger units

hierarchy

arranging times in a series of classes from general to specific

first letter technique

composing a word/sentence from the first letters of each word on a list (e.g. ROY G BIV)

narrative technique

making up stories that link a series of words together

Bower and Springston’s study

a study that found people recalled more accurately when a set of letters were group into meaningful units; proved the effectiveness of chunking (and the idea that more meaningful stimulus is encoded better)

Bower and Clark’s study

a study where participants were told to make up narrative stories to learn lists of words; those who made up stories in order to remember words had better recall than those who did not

Joshua Foer

wrote Moonwalking with Einstein; used interactive imagery using famous people to represent cards he needed to remember

retrospective memory

remembering info acquired in the past

prospective memory

remembering something needed to be done in the future

two components of prospective memory

established intention to accomplish a task in the future; fulfilling what was planned at said future time

external memory aid

any external device that enhances recall and retrieval (e.g. a grocery list)

metacognition

knowledge and control of one’s own cognitive processes; thinking about thinking; helps supervise the way people select/use memory strategies

self-knowledge

information that people believe about themselves/knowledge about one’s own social behavior, personality, or attitudes

two kinds of metacognition

metamemory; metacomprehension

metamemory

self-knowledge of one’s own knowledge, monitoring, and control of memory

foresight bias

the tendency to be overconfident about future performance

Dunning and coauthors’ study

a study conducted on metamemory; found that students that did poorly on an administered exam overestimated how well they did, and memory estimates are more accurate after recall delay (or over individual items)

Nelson and Leonesio’s study

a study conducted on metamemory; students were examined based on the duration of their study time; found that students take a more active approach to studying; self-paced studying doesn’t necessarily improve recall; people spend more time trying to learn more difficult subjects but often end their studying before learning is truly complete

tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon

knowing a word being sought, but being unable to retrieve the actual word

feeling of knowing phenomenon

knowing information, but being unable to recall it in that moment

Brown and McNeil’s study

a study conducted on the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon; participants were presented definitions of uncommon English words and then asked to repeat them back (after delay), participants would answer with similar sounding (but incorrect) results