Memory Chapter 7 Psychology in Everyday Life

These flashcards cover key vocabulary and concepts related to memory from the psychology chapter, including definitions of memory types, processes involved, and strategies for improvement.

Memory

The persistence of learning over time through the encoding, storage, and retrieval of information.

Information-processing model

Compares human memory to a computer’s operation, suggesting that one must encode, store, and retrieve information to remember.

Encoding

The process of getting information into our brain’s memory system.

Storage

The retention of encoded information over time.

Retrieval

The process of getting information out of memory storage.

Explicit memory

Retention of facts and personal events that can be consciously retrieved; formed via effortful processing.

Implicit memory

Retention of learned skills or classically conditioned associations, formed via automatic processing.

Sensory memory

The first stage in forming explicit memories, recording immediate and very brief information.

Chunking

A memory strategy involving organizing items into familiar and manageable units.

Spaced practice

Spacing effect; most effective when new info is meaningful. distributed study produces better long-term retention than massed study (craming). 

Retrieval cues

Hints or prompts that help locate a memory stored in the brain.

Long-term potentiation (LTP)

The increase in a synapse’s firing potential, believed to be a physical basis for learning and memory.

Amnesia

The inability to form new memories (anterograde) or to remember past information (retrograde).

Misinformation effect

The phenomenon wherein a memory is corrupted by misleading information.

Source amnesia

Faulty memory regarding how, when, or where information was learned.

Testing effect

The phenomenon whereby repeated self-testing improves memory retention.

Emotional memory

A type of memory related to emotional experiences, often accompanied by heightened recall due to hormonal changes.

Flashbulb memory

A clear and vivid memory of an emotionally significant moment or event.

Serial Position Effect

The tendency to recall best the last and first items in a list.

Proactive interference

The disruptive effect of older learning on the recall of new information.

Retroactive interference

The disruptive effect of newer learning on the recall of old information.

Motivated forgetting

A defense mechanism whereby painful or unacceptable memories are unconsciously repressed.

Rehearsal

The process of repeating information to enhance memory retention.

Working memory

Newer understanding of short-term memory

Information enters the working memory through vision and auditory rehearsal.

It includes the conscious and active processing of:

Incoming auditory and visual-spatial information

Information retrieved from long-term memory

It processes already stored information

Effortful processinf

•Encoding that requires attention and conscious effort

automatic processing

Unconscious encoding of everyday information and well-learned information

iconic memory

Picture-image memory of a scene

echoic memory

Sensory memory of sounds

semantic memory

: Explicit memory of facts and general knowledge

episodic memory

Explicit memory of personally experienced events

hippocampus role in memory

The hippocampus acts as a loading dock where the brain registers and temporarily stores aspects of an event. explicit memories are processed here

frontal lobes ijn memory

Memories migrate for storage via the memory consolidation process.

The right and left frontal lobes store different information.

A good night’s sleep supports memory consolidation.

The hippocampus and the brain cortex display rhythmic patterns of activity during sleep.

cerebellum

Extends out from the rear of the human brainstem

Plays an important role in forming and storing memories created by classical conditioning

basal ganglia

Involves deep brain structure involved in motor movement

Help form memories for physical skills, which are also implicit memories

long term potentiation

Increase in a synapse’s firing potential Believed to be a physical basis for learning and memory

After LTP, a current passing through the brain would not erase old memories.

priming

Activation, often unconsciously, of particular associations in memory

retrevial cues

serve as anchor points for pathways that can be followed to access a memory.

Mood-congruent memory

The tendency to recall experiences that are consistent with an individual's current good or bad mood

state dependent memory

What is learned in one state can be easily recalled if the individual is in the same state.

encoding failure

Age-related memory decline

Conscious attention to limited portions of a vast number of sights

storage decay

The course of forgetting is initially rapid, but then levels off with time.

It is explained by the gradual fading of the physical memory trace.

retrevial failure

•Sometimes even stored information cannot be accessed, which leads to forgetting.

•Retrieval failure stems from interference and motivated forgetting.

imagination effect

Occurs when repeatedly imagining fake actions and events creates false memories

reconsolidation

: The process in which previously stored memories, when retrieved, are potentially altered before being stored again

All memories are false to some degree.