Memory: Brain Structures, Processes, and Types in Psychology

Memory

Learning that has persisted over time. Memory is not accurate, objective, or recording things that happened step-by-step— they are reconstructions, meaning they are malleable and changeable.

Hippocampus

The part of the brain structure that is heavily involved with memory and its storing.

Encoding

It is done in two different ways, effortful and automatic (effortless).

Effortful Encoding

When you purposefully try to remember something, making the effort to remember.

Automatic Encoding

Relies on space, time, and frequency— it is something that you don't quite pay attention to on purpose.

Example of Effortful Encoding

Trying to remember someone's name, trying to remember someone's face.

Example of Automatic Encoding

Re-tracing your steps to find something you lost that day.

Storage

Storing encoded memories for later use.

Retrieval

Using external information in order to call stored memories to the front of your mind more easily.

Retrieval Cues

What allow us to retrieve memories, some of those retrieval cues being the context of the situation and the order of encoding that occurred.

Serial Position Effect

The order of encoding that occurred.

Sensory Memory

First stop for all incoming sensory information.

Working / Short Term Memory

Active maintenance of information.

Long Term Memory

Permanent storage of information.

Limitations of Sensory Memory

Duration is less than 5 seconds.

Limitations of Working / Short Term Memory

Capacity 7+/2 & duration of 15-20 seconds.

Limitations of Long Term Memory

No limitations.

Rehearsal

A strategy used to overcome the major limitations of our memory store.

Chunking

A strategy used to overcome the major limitations of our memory store.

Iconic Memory

Mind's eye; a perfect memory for ¼ of a second.

Echoic Memory

Mind's ear; A perfect memory for 2-3 seconds.

Working Memory

Also known as short-term memory; the active maintenance of that information that came from sensory memory.

Explicit Memories

A mixture of semantic and episodic memories.

Implicit Memories

Procedural memories.

Explicit

conscious memories

Semantic

general knowledge

Episodic

specific events

Implicit

unintentional memories

Procedural

Hippocampal damage

Amnesia

Anterograde Amnesia

inability to form new memories.

Retrograde Amnesia

inability to retrieve old memories.

Alzheimer's Disease

Transience

memories become inaccessible with the passage of time.

Blocking

failure to retrieve information.

Absent-Mindedness

inattention to details.

Bias

memories of past are skewed by current thoughts, feelings, and beliefs.

Misattribution

memory attributed to the wrong source.

Suggestibility

incorporating misleading information into memory.

Persistence

unwanted intrusions of memory.

Semantic Encoding

the process of relating new information in a meaningful way to knowledge that is already stored in memory.

Visual Imagery Encoding

the process of storing new information by converting it into mental pictures.

Organizational Encoding

the process of categorizing information according to the relationships among a series of items.

Short-Term Memory

a type of storage that holds non-sensory information for more than a few seconds but less than a minute.

Long-Term Memory

a type of storage that holds information for hours, days, weeks, or years.

Consolidation

the process by which memories become stable in the brain.

Reconsolidation

the process whereby memories can become vulnerable to disruption when they are recalled, thus requiring them to be consolidated again.

Retrieval Cue

External information that is associated with stored information and helps bring it to mind.

Retroactive Interference

Situations in which later learning later impairs memory for information acquired earlier.

Proactive Interference

Situations in which earlier learning impairs memory for information acquired later.

Prospective Memory

Remembering to do things in the future.

Explicit Memory

the act of consciously or intentionally retrieving past experiences.

Implicit Memory

the influence of past experiences on later behavior and performance, even without an effort to remember them or an awareness of the recollection.

Transfer-appropriate Processing

the idea that memory is likely to transfer from one situation to another when the encoding and retrieval contexts of the situation match.

Primacy

remembering things at the beginning of a list.

Recency

remembering things at the end of a list.

Retrieval-Induced Forgetting

A process by which retrieving an item from long-term memory impairs subsequent recall of related items.