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10.04.2021 Chapter 7 - Lecture notes 7
General Psychology (PSYC 1000)
University of New Orleans
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Memory
● In our day to day experience, memory is very much related to learning: If you can’t remember it, then you didn’t learn it! ● In psychology, learning and memory have been studied separately. ● Reason: learning has been studied as conditioning , and conditioning emphasizes the environment, not the organism. ● Psychologists who study memory generally do not care about conditioning. ● Mentalist perspective ○ From a mentalist perspective (mental processes, as opposed to conditioning), memory involves three processes: ○ Coding ( code and put into memory ) ○ Storage ( maintain in memory ) ○ Retrieval ( recover from memory ) ● These three processes operate to different extents on different memory ○ Sensory memory: ■ Temporary storage of sensory information ■ Capacity: high ■ Duration: less than one second ■ Example: What was the picture? If you remember the image, what about the details? It was all there; just didn’t have time to pay attention ○ If you pay attention, it moves onto short term memory. ○ Short term memory: ■ Brief storage of information currently being used ■ Capacity: limited ■ Duration: less than twenty seconds ■ Short term memory is also called working memory because it is the memory that we consciously use all the time. ■ An interesting characteristic of working memory is that we can keep only about 7 items in it at any given time ○ If you elaborate, it moves onto long term memory. ○ Long term memory: ■ Relatively permanent storage of information ■ Capacity: unlisted (?) ■ Duration: long or permanent ■ Long term memory comes in at least two types, with subtypes. ■ Declarative: things we can talk about (1) ● Episodic: the things you remember ● Semantic: things you talk about regularly ■ Procedural: things we can do (2) ● Skills: things you know how to do ● Habits: things you do regularly ○ Some psychologists believe that procedural memory (implicit memory) can be
formed without the passage through sensory and short term memories. ○ Once memories are formed, they are good only if we can remember them. ○ As you know from your own experience, it is much easier to recognize than to recall. ○ This, of course, is the reason why you think that multiple choice texts are easier than essay tests. They are easier if the questions are the same. ○ Other things that make a difference: ■ Mnemonics: “ In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue “ ■ Distributed practice (spacing effort) Information that is presented over spaced intervals is learned and retained more easily and more effectively than information squeezed together ■ State dependency (mood congruence) ■ Primary (and recency) effects ○ Biological Bases of Memory ■ Where is memory stored? ■ Studies of people with brain lesions due to stroke or surgery revealed that there are two locations in the brain that are important for memory. One for declarative (explicit) memory and procedural (implicit) memory. ■ Declarative memory: hippocampus ■ Procedural memory: basal ganglia and cerebellum ■ Procedural Memory ● Automatic ● Implicit memories without conscious recall ● Processed in cerebellum and basal ganglia ● Space, time, frequency ● Motor and cognitive skills ■ Declarative Memory ● Effortful ■ Interesting complication: the hippocampus doesn’t seem to actually store declarative memory but to provide passage into long term memory storage elsewhere in the brain. ■ We know this because of people with hippocampal damage: they exhibit anterograde amnesia but not retrograde amnesia. ■ Where is memory stored? ■ If memory is not stored in the hippocampus, where is it stored? ■ We can’t actually see memories stored somewhere in the brain, and these days it is believed that memories are stored in multiple locations ■ Memory at the cellular level. ● Long term potentiation (LTP) is a persistent increase in synaptic strength following high-frequency stimulation of a chemical synapse. ● As memories are thought to be encoded by modification of synaptic strength, LTP is widely considered one of the major cellular mechanisms that underlies learning and memory.
to process a single memory 20. Retrieval: the memory process that occurs when information that was retained in memory comes out of storage 21. Serial position effect: the tendency to recall the items at the beginning and end of a list more readily than those in the middle 22. Autobiographical memory: a special form of episodic memory, consisting of a person’s recollections of his or her life experiences 23. Flashbulb memory: the memory of emotionally significant events that people often recall with more accuracy and vivid imagery than everyday events 24. Motivated forgetting: forgetting that occurs when something is so painful or anxiety-laden that remembering it is intolerable 25. Inference theory: the theory that people forget not because memories are lost from storage but because other information gets in the way of what they want to remember 26. Proactive interference: situation in which material that was learned earlier disrupts the recall of material that was learned later 27. Retroactive interference: situation in which material that was learned later disrupts the retrieval of information that was learned earlier 28. Decay theory: theory stating that when an individual learns something new, a neurochemical memory trace forms, but then disintegrates over time, suggesting that the passage of time always increases forgetting 29. Tip of the tongue (TOT) phenomenon: a type of effortful retrieval associated with a person’s feeling that he or she knows something (say, a word or a name) but cannot quite pull it out of memory. 30. Retrospective memory: remembering information from the past. 31. Prospective memory: remembering information about doing something in the future; includes memory for intentions 32. Amnesia: the loss of memory 33. Anterograde amnesia: a memory disorder that affects the retention of new information and events 34. Retrograde amnesia: memory loss for a segment of the past but not for new events 35. Episodic memory: the retention of information about where, when, and what of life’s happenings 36. Script: a schema for an event, often containing information about physical features, people, and typical occurances
Test yourself: 1. How do psychologists define memory? 2. What three important processes play key roles in memory? 3. Which memory process is centrally involved when we recall information? 4. What four encoding processes do not happen automatically but instead require effort? 5. How does divided attention differ from selective attention? 6. Explain the process of elaboration and its importance. 7. How do sensory memory and short-term memory differ in terms of their duration? 8. What two kinds of memory are at the top level of long-term memory, and how is each defined? 9. How do the schema theory of memory and the connectionist network theory of memory differ in terms of their explanation of memories? 10. What are the primacy effect and recency effect, and how do psychologists explain each? 11. What is the difference between recall and recognition? 12. Explain autobiographical memory and the reminiscence bump. 13. What is the term for the failure of information to enter long-term memory? 14. Name four factors that, according to psychologists, may be the cause of the retrieval failure. 15. What is the tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) phenomenon, and what does it reveal about how we store information? 16. What steps can you take to ensure that your course information is well organized? 17. Give at least three tips for encoding information and at least three tips for rehearsing information. 18. What strategies can help you retrieve essential information when taking an examination? 19. What crucial functions does autobiographical memory serve? 20. What did McAdams mean when he described certain individuals as generative? 21. What factors are involved in keeping memory sharp as we age?
10.04.2021 Chapter 7 - Lecture notes 7
Course: General Psychology (PSYC 1000)
University: University of New Orleans
