Long-Term Memory: Encoding & Retrieval

Importance of long term memory

is used by a wide variety of species: plants (reacts and remembers when it was touched), squirrels, and people

What consists inside long term memory?

Declarative memory and non-declarative memory

What consists in declarative memory?

Semantic memory and episodic memory

What consists in nondeclarative memory?

procedural memory, conditioning (operant and classical), and priming

Semantic memory

facts, has no time stamp of when something happened, source is unknown (you just know it)

Episodic memory (autobiographical)

specific episodes in time, time stamped, known source (ex. your 5th birthday party)

Procedural memory

know how to’s, how to ride a bicycle

Conditioning

classical and operant

Priming

implicit memory, experiencing a stimulus multiple times changes response (ex. word is read faster the second time)

Capacity of long term memory

very large, if it’s not limited

Duration of long term memory

Up to a lifetime, sometimes without even practice

Encoding

learning the material

Retrieval

accessing the material

What consists in retrieval?

recall and recognition

Recall

you generate the material from your own memory (cued vs. uncued)

Cued vs. uncued recall

cued: essay question, uncued: fill in the blank

Recognition

you identified studied/old material (ex. mc questions)

Repetition

more likely to remember something if exposed to it more than once

Repetitions are better when

spaced apart than massed together

For good practice, (1)

both amount and distribution matter, better to have less practice per day but across more days, repetition separated by other things, and best practice comes from retrieving info at expanding intervals

For good practice, (2)

repetition separated by other things, and best practice comes from retrieving info at expanding intervals

Penny memory challenge ultimate finding

most people have encoded the items on the penny but not their relationship to each other despite seeing them repeatedly

Penny memory challenge detail findings

repetition is a successful study strategy, some info needs more than simple exposures, and even after many repetitions, it may not be enough to ensure something will be encoded

Facts about organization

ppl naturally organize info, links new info to prior knowledge, provides “support” for new info, one type of elaborative encoding

Different ways of organizing

taxonomic, thematic, mnemonics (first letters), mnemonics (method of loci)

Taxonomic

grouping similar/related items together

Thematic

making up a story (works well for things that must be remembered in an order bc stories naturally have an order)

First letter mnemonics

uses the first letter of words in a phrase as a cue (ex. PEMDAS)

Mnemonics: method of loci

things to be remembered are placed at locations in a familiar place (done mentally)

Shallow level processing

surface, perceptual features

Deep level processing

linked to meaning

The outcome of knowing if you’re going to be tested vs not knowing

doesn’t change unless you change the way that you study

Study a list of words by

appearance, sound, meaning, and self relevance

Appearance (structural = shallow

are there any capital levels in it?

Sound (phonemic = shallow)

rhymes with…?

Meaning (semantic = deep)

means the same as…

Self relevance

does this adjective describe you?

Generation effect methods

read, generate, active learning

Generate

opposite of word, associate, same-category, rhyme, synonym

Active learning is better than

passive bc it makes you practice grabbing the info from memory

Strategies for encoding

distinctiveness (shall and deep conditions) and organization

Shallow conditions

nondistinctive: saying word normally (ex. glove), distinctive: using standard rules (emphasizing the v sound)

Deep conditions

nondistinctive: say typical adjective (glove = leather), distinctive: say unusual adjective (glove = bumpy)

Distinctiveness

possessing features that make something stand out in some way

Distinctiveness increases memory by

increasing attention at encoding and retrievability

Primary distinctiveness

with respect to the immediate context (Von Restorff effect)

Von Restorff effect

the more something stands out from the crowd, the more likely it is to be seen and remembered

Secondary distinctiveness

with respect to prior experience

Examples of secondary distinctiveness

unusual face, first life experiences, orthographic distinctiveness, unusual faces

Orthographic distinctiveness

words with unusual spellings are well remembered

Organization involves encoding

similarities bc unrelated/uncommon elements need elaboration

Distinctiveness involves encoding

differences bc related/common elements need distinctiveness

Successful retrieval requires knowing where to look for info (elaboration helps) and

being able to distinguish desired memory and similar ones (distinctiveness helps)

The primacy and recency effect aren’t as relevant in

long term memory compared to short term memory

Not just encoding matter but the

appropriate match between encoding and retrieval too

Transfer appropriate processing: methods

encoding, retrieval, depth of processing hypothesis, transfer appropriate processing hypothesis

Encoding: learning a list of words

rhyme task and meaning task

Retrieval: recognize the word

“standard”: list of old words mixed with new, rhyme: list of words that rhymed with old (vs. new)

Depth of processing hypothesis

memory should be better for meaning task

Transfer appropriate processing hypothesis

if you learn something the way that matches how you’ll be tested, you’ll remember it better

Context dependent learning

remembering better when in the same environment you learned the info

context dependent divers experiment

divers remembered the list of words when they were underwater if they learned in while underwater

Being in the same environment reminds you of

cues when you study while you’re taking a test

State dependent learning

recalling is easier when your mind/body is in the same state as during emotional, physical, or chemical state

Chemical state example

those who studied high performed better high compared to when they studied high and tested sober

How can we retrieve memory from long term memory?

part of the answer depends on encoding (amount, organization, distinctiveness) and match between encoding and retrieval (transfer appropriate processing and context)

Amnesia medically

damage to medial temporal lobe, often in the hippocampus

Amnesia: Causes

Examples: anoxia (loss of oxygen), HM surgery, Clive Wearing (worst case of amnesia)

Amnesia definition

selective loss of long term memory (sometimes short term memory okay)

Retrograde amnesia

Can form new declarative memories but lose some old declarative memories

Characteristics of retrograde amnesia

may lose decades or only a week or so of memories, most likely to recover oldest memories, spares semantic and procedural memories

Anterograde amnesia

can remember events prior to injury but can’t form new declarative memories

Characteristics of anterograde amnesia

short term memory (seconds to minutes) is fine, all sensory modalities ARE affected, doesn’t affect procedural memory, temporal gradient

Temporal gradient

see memory loss for events a few years prior to injury

Amnesia tells us that it supports a distinction between

the processes involved in forming a memory and the representations that are eventually formed and suggests a consolidation process takes years to complete

3 study conditions (allows for better memory)

letter judgement, rhyme judgement, meaning judgement

Two test conditions

recognition - explicit measure, perceptual identification (see word for 35 ms and report it) - implicit measure

Levels of processing

semantic > rhyme > letter

There’s usually a depth/level of processing for

explicit tasks but not for implicit tasks