Unit 5 - cognition pt 1

Memory

Memory

Persistence of learning over time

Includes

-encoding

-storage

-retrieval of info

Recall

Measure of memory when a person must retrieve information learned earlier

-fill in the blank question

Recognition

Measure of memory when the person identifies previously learned info

-multiple choice questions

Relearning

Measure of memory when learning something a second time

-learning information that was previously learned faster than the 1st time

Encoding

Getting info into the memory system

-Making information meaningful

Storage

Retains encoded info over time

Retrieval

Getting info out of memory storage

Parallel processing

Processing multiple things at the same time

-natural mode of info processing for many functions

Sensory memory

Brief recording of sensory info in the memory system

• shortest time info is held

Short-term memory

Holds a few items briefly, before the info is stored and forgotten

Miller’s number 7 theory - you can hold 5-9 items in short term memory

• (7 +/- 2)

• least amount held

Long-term memory

Relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system

• knowledge

• skills

• experiences

Working memory

Conscious, active processing of auditory/visual info and info retrieved from long-term memory

• type of short-term memory

• will go away if not rehearsed or connected to something in long term memory

Explicit memory

Retention of facts and experiences (conscious)

• aka declarative memory

Effortful processing

Encoding requiring attention and conscious effort

Automatic processing

Unconscious encoding

• space

• time

• frequency

• well learned info (word meanings)

Implicit memory

Retention of learned skills or classically conditioned association

• unconscious recollection

• aka nondeclarative memory

Iconic memory

A moment of a picture-image memory

(sensory memory)

Echoic memory

A moment of the ability to recall sounds and words within 3 or 4 seconds even if your attention is elsewhere

• sounds

• sensory memory

Chunking

Organizing information into manageable units or similar groups of info

• occurs automatically

Mnemonics

Vivid imagery and organization devices to aid memory

Spacing effect

Distributed practice in order to have better long-term retention

Testing effect

Active retrieval instead of rereading information

\n

• aka retrieval practice effect

  • test-enhanced learning

Shallow processing

Encoding on a basic level

• Structure or appearance of words

Deep processing

Encoding based on meaning (meaning of words)

• tends to yield the best retention

Semantic memory

• explicit memory

• Facts and general knowledge

• one of two conscious memory systems

Episodic memory

• explicit memory

• personally experienced events

• one of two conscious memory systems

Hippocampus

• located in the limbic system

• helps process for storage of explicit (conscious) memories of facts and events

Memory consolidation

Neural storage of a long-term memory

Flashbulb memory

Clear, sustained memory of an emotionally significant moment/event

Long-term potentiation

• Increase in cell’s firing potential after brief rapid simulation

• neural basis for learning and memory

• all or nothing response

Priming

Unconscious activation of certain associations causing changes to one’s perception, memory, or response

Encoding specificity principle

Cues and contexts specific to a memory will be most effective in helping the recall

Mood-congruent memory

Tendency to recall experiences that are consistent to current good or bad mood

Serial position effect

Recalling the last and first items in a list

\n

• last (recency effect)

• first (primary effect)

Anterograde amnesia

Inability to form new memories

• 50 first dates

Retrograde amnesia

Inability to retrieve info from one’s past

• dory

Proactive interference

Disruptive effect of older learning on the recall of new information

• Affecting the new

Retroactive interference

Disruptive effect of newer learning on the recall of old information

• Affecting the old

Repression

Banishes memories from consciousness that are anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories

• defense mechanism

Reconsolidation

Previous stored memories when retrieved are altered before being stored again

Misinformation

Misleading information distorts one’s memory of an event

Source amnesia

Faulty memory of how, when, or where info was learned or imagined

• aka misattribution

• heart of many false memories

Deja vu

Eerie sense that “I’ve experienced this before”

• cues may unconsciously trigger retrieval of an earlier experience

• skills

• classically conditioned associations

• space

• time

• frequency

What information do we process automatically?

Feeds some info into working memory for active processing there

How does sensory memory work?

• chunking

• mnemonics

• hierarchies

• distributed practice

What are some effortful processing strategies that can help us remember new information?

Hierarchies

information composed of a few broad concepts divided and subdivided into narrower concepts and facts

cerebellum

• stores classically conditioned memories

basal ganglia

• motor movement and help form procedural memories for skills

What roles do the cerebellum and basal ganglia play in memory processing?

Children are susceptible to the misinformation effect.

• if questioned with neutral wording they can accurately recall events and people involved

How reliable are young children’s eyewitness descriptions?

Peg-word system

Ex: “One is a bun, two is a shoe, three is a tree, four is a door”

Self-reference effect

we recall information we can meaningfully relate to ourselves

Hermann Ebbinghaus

• Conducted research about the response speed when recalling or recognizing information indicates memory strength

• Pioneer memory researcher

• forgetting curve

Richard Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin

• Explained memory forming process

George A. Miller

• Miller’s magic number

• short-term/working memory can only hold 5-9 pieces of memory at a time

Eric Kandel

• Observed synaptic changes during learning in neurons

• Long-term potentiation

Elizabeth Loftus

• Demonstrated how memory works and how it can be altered by external factors

suggestibility

interferes with memory and reconstructs it

It can be reconstructed/influenced by external factors

Why is memory unreliable?

Cognition

Activities associated with thinking, knowing, and remembering

Prototype

A mental image or best example of a category

• when someone says flower people think rose before orchid

Creativity

Ability to produce new and valuable ideas

Convergent thinking

Determining the single best solution

Divergent thinking

• expanding the # of possible solutions

• diverges in different directions

Algorithm

Logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a problem.

• takes longer but there are less errors

Heuristic

Simple thinking strategy to make judgments and solve problems efficiently/quicker

• More likely for errors

Insight

A sudden realization of a solution that contrasts with strategy-based solutions

• aha moment

Confirmation bias

Tendency to seek evidence for our ideas over evidence against our ideas

Fixation

Cognition - inability to see a new perspective (obstacle to problem solving)

\n

Personality theory - seeks more pleasurable solutions

Mental State

-tendency to approach a problem in one way that was successful in the past

Intuition

Automatic feeling or thought

• goes against explicit reasoning

Representativeness heuristic

Estimating likelihood of events based on particular prototypes

• may lead us to ignore relevant info

Availability heuristic

Estimating the likelihood of events based on available memory

Overconfidence

• being more confident than correct

• overestimating the accuracy of our beliefs and judgements

Belief perseverance

Clinging onto initial conception despite info that discredited that conception

Framing

How an issue is worded can affect decisions and judgements

Language

Combining words to communicate meaning

• spoken

• written

• signed

Phoneme

The smallest distinctive sound unit

Morpheme

Smallest unit that carries meaning

• might be a word or part of a word

• ex: prefix

Grammar

Language’s set of rules that allows people to communicate

Babbling stage

• stage of speech development

• infant spontaneously utters sounds at first unrelated to the household language

• begins at 4 months

One-word stage

• speaks with one word

• age 1-2

• says cookie (when wanting a snack)

Two-word stage

• speaks in two word statements

• begins about age 2

Telegraphic speech

• mostly uses nouns and verbs

Ex: go car

Aphasia

Impairment of language

\n

Aphasia in broca’s area

impairing of speaking

Aphasia in Wernicke’s area

impairing understanding

speech

Broca’s area controls

understanding

Wernicke’s area controls

Linguistic determinism

Whorf’s hypothesis aka Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis

• language controls the way we think and see the world around us

Linguistic influence

• Weaker form of linguistic relativism

• idea that language affects thought

Linguistic relativism

Language that you are raised in determines the kind of thoughts you will have

Robert Sternberg

Believed creativity has 5 components

5 components of creativity

• expertise

• imaginative thinking skills

• a venturesome personality

• intrinsic motivation

• creative environment

Wolfgang Koher

Showed that humans aren’t the only ones to display insight

Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman

Researched representativeness and availability heuristics

Steven Pinker

Noted that noises contain information

Noam Chomsky

• Argued that the brain had a built-in predisposition to learn grammar rules

• Language is learned naturally

Paul Broca

• Discovered Broca’s area

• Found when damaged people can’t speak

Carl Wernicke

• Discovered Wernicke’s area

• Found  when damage people don’t understand language

Benjamin Lee Whorf

• Hypothesized language itself shapes a person's basic ideas

• Linguistic determinism