Memory - Topic 3

PSYC 100 Memory Topic

Distributed vs. Massed Study

Spread your study time out.

Testing Effect

Frequently test yourself on the material you read.

Elaborative Rehearsal

Connect new knowledge with existing knowledge instead of memorizing.

Mnemonic Devices

The more cues you can connect from your knowledge to new material, the better.

Levels of Processing Approach

Work to process ideas deeply and meaningfully (in your own words).

Memory

Retention & Retrieval of Skill & Knowledge

Reconstructive

Nature of Memory. Recalling is active or reconstructive

Nature of Mind or Mental Lexicon

Memories of similar things are inter-connected

Passive record keeping, such as video recorder (64%), to preserve the past. Active reconstruction, to anticipate the future

Paradox of Memory

Memories are both surprisingly good and poor

Illusion

False but subjectively compelling memory

Explicit Memory

Memories we consciously make: Episodic and Semantic

Episodic Memory

Memory for specific events (an episode)

Semantic Memory

General Knowledge. Not tied to a specific time and place.

Implicit Memory

Revealed indirectly. Procedural, Priming, Perceptual, Classical Conditioning

Procedural Memory

Knowing how to do something (skills, such as playing an instrument)

Priming

Changes in belief and perception caused by previous experience

Perceptual Learning

Recalibration of perceptual systems due to experience

Classical Conditioning

Learning about associations through stimuli

The three major systems of memory

Sensory Storage, Short-term storage, Long-term storage

Sensory Memory

Brief storage of perceptual (or raw) information before it is passed to STM

Each sense has its own sensory memory.

• Iconic (visual) lasts only 1/3 – 1 second;

• Echoic (auditory) can last 5-10 seconds.

Echoic Memory

Auditory, helps in taking notes during lecture

Iconic Memory

Eye movement is made up of fixations & saccades. We see the world continuously due to this. Iconic Memory lasts longer than fixations and saccades.

Saccadic suppression

No visual processing during saccades

• Visual processing only during fixations

• Therefore we should see in a “on and off” manner

• But we see the world as a visual continuum

Short Term Memory (Working Memory)

ability to hold info we are currently thinking about, attending to, or processing actively

Chunking

Organizing info into meaningful grouping, allowing us to extend the span of STM

Magic Number of Working Memory

+ - 7 seconds

Decay

information naturally fades over time

Interference

loss of information due to competition with new, incoming information

Ways to extend duration of info in STM

Rehearsal and Elaborative Rehearsal

Rehearsal

repeating information in STM, extends its duration.

• Maintenance rehearsal is simply repeating STM information in its original form.

Two types of interference

Retroactive and Proactive (thinking about language example)

Retroactive interference

New learning interfering old information

Proactive interference

Old information interfering with new learning

What makes interference stronger?

When learning information that is similar to old information you have

Long Term Memory

Relatively enduring store of information. Includes facts, experiences, and skills we've developed over a lifetime

Approach of Memory

Deeper the processing, better the recall

• Visual < Phonological < Semantic

Serial Position Effect

Probability of recalling an item depends on its position in the memorized list of items

Primacy effect

tendency to remember stimuli presented earliest (Items in LTM at the time of recall)

Recency effect

Tendency to remember stimuli presented most recently (Items still in STM at the time of recall)

Three processes of memory

Encoding, Storage, Retrieval

Encoding

Getting the information into memory (ex. reading a book)

Storage

Keeping information in memory (ex. putting book back into its proper shelf)

Retrieval

The reactivation or reconstruction of info from memory (ex. picking the book back from its shelf)

Why may we forget someone’s name after meeting them in a party?

The infomation (the name) was never attended to or encoded.

The 3 R’s of Retrieval

Recall, Recognition, and Relearning

Recall

generating previously remembered information

Recognition

selecting previously remembered information from an array of options

Relearning – “methods of savings”

How much more quickly we reacquire something learned before

What is one of the best replicated effect in all history?

Distributed versus massed practice

Encoding Specificity

We are more likely to remember something when the conditions present at the time we encoded it are also present at retrieval.

Context Dependent Learning

Superior retrieval when the external context of the original memories matches the retrieval context (ex. Scuba Divers Study)

What does not guarantee accuracy of a memory?

Confidence, Emotion & Detail

False Memory

Memories can form, they are much more fallible than we believe

Flashbulb memory

Emotional memory that is extraordinarily vivid and detailed (ex. 9/11, shuttle blow up)

Phantom flashbulb memories

A study showed that a student recalled a significant event differently about 2 years later, but they didn’t mean to lie

Suggestive Memory Techniques

Procedure that encourages patients to recall memories that may or may not have taken place (ex. smashed vs touched)

Misinformation Effect

Creation of fictitious memories by providing misleading info about an event after it takes place (ex. “remember when you were lost in the mall?”)

• People’s tendency to include the misinformation as part of their recall of the original experience.

Schema

An individual’s mental Rn that summarizes her knowledge about a certain type of event or situation. (ex. remembering books in a prof’s office but they weren’t there)

Semantic Association

In our mind (mental lexicon), semantically related words are networked together

Eyewitness testimony is less accurate when:

• Different race from the witnesses,

• after they talk to other witnesses,

• only got a brief glimpse,

• was under stress during the crime,

• saw someone else shortly after the event,

• under weapon focus

Eyewitness Testimony is more accurate when:

• Sequential lineups (one person at a time) than simultaneous lineups (in groups)

• Police telling the witness that the true criminal might or might not be present in the lineup (reduces demand chars)

• Person conducting the lineup be blind to who the suspect is (similar to Rosenthal effect)

False Memory Controversy

Psychoanalysts started making everyone believe in abuse they had never recalled before seeing them. (Freudian view)

Amygdala

Formation & Storage of Emotional Memories.

• Threat evaluation

• Fear conditioning

Hippocampus

Learning

• Memory consolidation: STM ➟ LTM

• Spatial navigation

• Alzheimer’s Disease: memory loss & disorientation

• Bilateral damage: anterograde amnesia

Retrograde amnesia

loss of memories of events before the damage

Anterograde amnesia

inability to form new memories

What disease is consistent with cortical loss?

Alzheimer's Disease

Procedural Knowledge

Knowledge of how to do something, e.g. riding a bike

Explicit/ Declarative Knowledge

Knowledge of info that can be expressed in words

Famous case of H.M.

Both hippocampus and amygdala were removed to try to cure epilepsy, could not form new episodic memories and could not recall some old memories