Unit 2.4- 2.7 - Encoding, Storing, Retrieving, and Forgetting Memories

Mnemonics

Memory aids, especially those techniques that use vivid imagery and organizational devices

Method of Loci

A strategy for memory enhancement, which uses visualizations of familiar spatial environments in order to enhance the recall of information

Chunking

Organizing items into familiar, manageable units; often occurs automatically

Spacing Effect

The tendency for distributed study to yield better long-term retention than is achieved through mass practice

Distributed Study

Breaking periods of review over several days

Mass Practice

Studying a little each night is more effective than cramming

Self-Referent Encoding

When information is meaningful to the individual, they are more likely to remember it

Sensory Memory

The immediate very brief recording of sensory information in the memory system

Serial Position Effect

Our tendency to best remember the items at the beginning and end of a list

Recency Effect

Only remembering the end of the list

A type of serial position effect

Primacy Effect

Only remembering the beginning of the list

A type of serial position effect

Sensory Memory

The immediate very brief recording of sensory information in the memory system

Types of sensory memory

Iconic - visual traces

Echoic - auditory traces

Short Term Memory

Activated memory that holds a few (5-9) items briefly (10-30 seconds) before the information is stored or forgotten

Long Term Memory

The relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system

Maintenance Rehearsal

Rote memorization

Involves repeating information

Elaborative Rehearsal

More detailed and involved additional memory aids like mnemonic devices

Autobiographical Memory

A collection of episodic memories

Recollections of moments you previously experiences

Amnesia

Memory loss, often due to brain damage

Anterograde Amnesia

An inability to form new memories

Retrograde Amnesia

An inability to recall past memories

Alzheimer’s disease

Damage to the brain’s receptors for acetylcholine, the neurotransmitter responsible for memory and learning

Traumatic Amnesia

Caused by a severe, non penetrative blow to head (car accident, sports injury); can lead to anything from loss of consciousness to coma

Hysterical or Fugue Amnesia

Linked to severe psychological trauma; usually temporary and linked to a traumatic event the mind cannot deal with. Memory often returns, although the memory of trauma may remain incomplete

Childhood or Infantile Amnesia

Inability to recall events from early childhood, could be linked to language development or immature brain

Recall

Retrieving information that is not currently in your conscious awareness but that was learned at an earlier time

Recognition

Identifying items previously learned

Retrieval Cues

Hints tied to help remember information

Context-Dependent Memory

The activation of memory when one returns to the setting of the original encoding

State-Dependent Memory

The tendency to recall experiences that are consistent with the state in which a person was at the time of encoding

Mood-Congruent Memory

The tendency to recall experiences that are consistent with one’s current good or bad mood

Testing Effect

By quizzing yourself or others, you strengthen your brain’s ability to bring forth a memory

Meta Cognition

Understanding how we think, remember, and learn

Forgetting Curve

Hermann Ebbinghaus

Memories decline rapidly, but then level off

Information is lost quickly but if you manage to remember something long enough, you are likely to remember it forever

Encoding Failure

Didn’t pay attention well enough to properly create the memory

Storage Decay

Memory has faded over time

Retrieval Failure

The memory is there but you can’t find it

Tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon

The feeling that a word or idea is just out of reach

Motivated forgetting

Repression and Suppression

Repression

Purposely losing a memory

Suppression

Unknowingly losing a memory, typically because of trauma

Interference

Competing information

Proactive Interference

Old information interfering with new information

Retroactive Interference

Newer information interfering with older information

Constructive Memory

A type of recollection characterized by the utilization of basic insights retained in the memory to build a more thorough and intricate report of an experience

Reconsolidation

The process that enables the update of a previously consolidated memory trance after its reactivation, through re-exposure to unconditioned stimuli, conditioned stimuli and/or context

Imagination Inflation

A type of memory distortion that occurs when imagining an event that never happened increases confidence in the memory of the event

Misinformation Effect

A phenomenon that occurs when misleading information has distorted one’s memory of an event

Source Amnesia

Impaired memory for how, where, or when information was learned despite good memory for the information itself