Lecture 6: Mechanisms Underlying Recovering Memories

Chapter 4

Motivated Forgetting

• Forgetting due to our motives/intentions

• E.g Trying to forget that you did bad on a test

• examined through the Directed Forgetting Procedure

Forgetting is beneficial as it allows us to…

• Achieve our goals

• Function in society

• Avoid being distracted by our past

Learning and Recalling

• Active processes

• our memories are vulnerable to change

• Our memories can be reshaped by others saying things to us or just remembering things differently

What is DFP and the 2 types?

• Being told to forget something purposely

• Types

  • Item Method Directed Forgetting

  • List Method Directed Forgetting

Item Method Directed Forgetting (Learning Phase)

• Encode words for a memory test

• immediately following each word youre told to remember or forget it

• e.g “Plate” - remember, “Football” - forget (do it for 30 items)

Item Method Directed Forgetting (Testing Phase)

• Used Old/New recognition Paradigm

Old/New Recognition Paradigm

• Testing our memory based on words you saw during the learning session vs words you never saw/learned before in the learning session

Item Method Directed Forgetting (Results)

• words that were supposed to be forgotten were dramatically impaired

• words that were supposed to be remembered were recalled quite well

• encoding deficit

Encoding Deficit

• Difficulty in being able to encode info

• its not being transferred to your LTM so you just forget

List Method Directed Forgetting (Learning Phase)

• encode words for a memory test

• halfway through the list, ask participants to forget

  • you say forget at unexpected times

• e.g “plate””dog””orange” FORGET

List Method Directed Forgetting (Testing Phase)

• uses the old/new recognition paradigm again like the other method

List Method Directed Forgetting (Results)

• Encoded the items in the first half of the list

  • Didn’t know you weren’t supposed to encode (remember

• No encoding deficits but rather retrieval deficits

  • not sure what you were supposed to remember so it’s hard to recall them

  • lower accessibility of those items

Barnier et al (2007) - Learning Phase

• generate a personal memory to each 24-cue word

• Group A: Forget 12 cue words, generate 12 new memories with new cue words

• Group B: Remember 12 cue words, generate 12 new memories with 12 new cue words

Barnier et al (2007) - Testing Phase & Results

• Test:

  • List all memories from both lists

• Results:

  • Reliable and strong directed forgetting effects

  • occurred for neutral, positive, and negative memories.

  • directed forgetting effects can take place for autobiographical memories

Repressors

• People who recall fewer negative events from their lives

• natural suppressors

• tend to report low levels of anxiety and stress even when physiological measures indicate strong emotional reactions to a certain person or situation.

Myers, Brewin & Power (1998)

• Directed forgetting procedure (list method)

• Repressors & non-repressors studied 2 lists of words: pleasant and unpleasant

• Results:

  • Repressors were better at using retrieval inhibition to block recall of unpleasant words

  • No difference between groups with blocking recall of pleasant words

Geraerts, Merckelbach, Jelicic & Smeets (2006)

• Repressors: 7 day diary reporting a) positive b) negative intrusions after having supposed them in the lab

• Over 7 day period, they reported the highest number of negative intrusions

• Results:

  • Short-term benefits

    • Fewer unwanted thoughts

  • Long-term consequences

    • Repressing emotions long term is not beneficial as the info will eventually resurface

False Memories

• Memory resembles a synthesis of experience not a replay of a videotape

  • Were always actively reconstructing memories as things change

  • People can come to believe memories of experiences that never happened

    • E.g childhood abuse

What are processes that form a coherent life narrative?

• Reconstruction Process

• Distance-Based Process

• Familiarity

Reconstruction Process

• Involves piecing together fragmented memories to understand something that has happened in the past

Distance-Based Process

• Taking a look at how we mentally place events in a timeline to help us understand how much time has passed

Familiarity

• Because you're familiar with past events that have happened, you believe it occurred at a specific time and place

Post-Event Misinformation

• After an event, you are told misinformation and your memory builds on it

Misinformation Effect

• Memories are not good evidence as we will never remember every single detail

• occurs when subjects believe they have seen items that were misleadingly suggested

Leading Questions

• Questions that lead you to answer a certain way that gives them a biased answer

• implying a specific answer that influences someone to give a specific answer

Loftus & Palmer (1974)

• Showed participants a video of a speeding car that crashes into another car

• Smashed 10% faster than contacted

• Showed participants similar situation of 2 cars crashing

  • Asked them did they see A broken headlight vs did they see THE broken headlight

  • Definite question (the) = fewer idk responses and more recognition of event

• Conclusions:

  • Minor changes to interview questions

    • Changes reported memory

  • Questions asked subsequent to an event can cause reconstruction

Reconstruction Model (Braine, 1965)

• Memories are stored as individual details with varying degrees of association

• Scripts can alter these memories

Roediger & McDermott (1995)

• Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) Paradigm

• Assess false memories among college students in the lab

• tested whether subjects would “remember” having heard words that had been only suggested, not presented

• many of their subjects falsely recalled and recognized having seen words that werent prensent but suggested (critical Lures)

Deese–Roediger–McDermott (DRM) paradigm

• a memory experiment that tests false memories.

• Participants hear or read a list of related words (e.g., "bed, rest, pillow, dream"),

• the critical lure (a strongly related word like "sleep") is missing.

• Later, many people falsely remember the missing word as part of the list.

• shows how our brains can create false memories based on associations.

What has research previously examined?

• Clinical experience

• Surveys of abuse survivors

• College students

Directed Forgetting - Terr (1991)

• Sexually abused children cope by developing an avoidant encoding style

• Able to disengage their attention from threatening cues

• Impaired memory for these cues

McNally, Clancy & Schacter (2001) - Encoding and Testing Phase

• Encoding Phase:

  • Shown words on a computer screen

  • Cue to either remember or forget previous words

    • 3 categories of words: Trauma-Related, Positive, Neutral

• Testing Phase:

  • Free recall task immediately after

  • Disregard previous "forget" or "remember" instruction

McNally, Clancy & Schacter (2001) - Results

• Normal memory functioning in the recovered memory group

• Recalled to-be-remembered words more often than to-be-forgotten words regardless of word valence

• Neither worse nor better memory for trauma-related words compared to control subjects (no abuse)

• Recovered memories group did not show better ability to avoid encoding Material related to abuse

Creating False Memories

• Some recovered memories may be false recollections induced by suggestive therapy.

• People with recovered CSA (Childhood Sexual Abuse) memories show higher false recall in the DRM paradigm, indicating difficulty distinguishing real vs. imagined events.