8. Applications Of Memory Flashcards
The case of HM is an example of a ____ dissociating function
Declarative، It involves STM and LTM
In the case of HM
Had surgery to cure severe epilepsy. After operation had near normal memory for events prior to surgery, and STM normal (approx 15 s).
But severe deficit for new memory of facts or of events occurring after surgery (encoding from STM to LTM).
Therefore, Able to learn motor skills (due to maintenance repetition) but could not remember which skills he had learned (Short term into LTM declarative)
Meaning of procedural and declarative dissociating function using Korsakoffs disease or “temporal lobe amnesia”
Patients are able to learn new skills (procedural); however, unable to learn new facts (declarative)
Declarative memory has specific brain structures which is responsible to convert STM to LTM
Example: A patient may show improved performance on a simple task over time, but each time they will show no recognition or memory of ever having performed the task before (despite obvious improvements).
The case of KC involves which dissociating functions of memory?
Semantic and episodic memory
The case of KC:
Damage to specific brain regions, (left frontal-parietal and right parieto-occipital lobes) following a traffic accident. Patient can no longer retrieve any personal memory of his past (autobiographical memory) but general knowledge remains good. Plays chess well but does not remember where he learned to play.
CAN learn SEMANTIC knowledge (Knowledge humans require in everyday life) when care is taken but CANNOT acquire EPISODIC knowledge
eg. will claim never to have met people met recently, but will be more friendly towards them than people he really hasn’t met.
Memory Recognition vs recall
Recognition refers to our ability to recognize an event or information (stimuli) as being familiar while recall is more specific and in more cognitive demand as it designated the retrieval of related details from memory
Because memory is not entirely stable ___ and recognition can be ____
Recall and recognition can be inaccurate
Since memory is unstable, the eye witness testimony by loftus shows us that
Through experiments it is revealed that memory can be radically altered by the way were questioned
Eg:
Eye Witness Reports (Loftus, 1979)
• Participants watch a film of an accident, one includes a STOP sign, the other a YIELD sign. Using specific wording, you can change people’s memory
How big was the stop sign by the road?’
• The participant won’t remember the fact that they saw a yield sign
• ‘Howfastwerethecarsgoingwhentheysmashedintoeachother?’ • Participants will recall the cars were going faster than they actually were.
The main causes of forgetting are
Time passing:
As we get older there is a rapid decay of the info in the WM
And with time cell death leads to the loss of LTM
Note: loss of LTM is accelerated due to dementia
Interference
Affects both WM and LTM, memory connections change due to pro- and retroactive interference of info
Causes of amnesia
Damage: head injury, stroke
Chronic alcohol abuse: karsakoffs syndrome (temporal lobe amnesia) due to a lack of vitamin B1 and thiamine in the brain, affecting storage
Disease: Alzheimer’s damage to Cortex, progressive deterioration from impaired memory skills especially episodic memory (abt ur life/past)
Reversible brain disease: tumours, deficiencies in vitamin B. Diseases, a haematoma, syphillis, hydrocephalus
Psychogenic memory loss: abuse or war
2 Types of amnesia (forms of memory loss)
Anterograde amnesia: inability to store new info
(As in patient hm: had procedural skills but not declarative- skills progressed but forgets he ever practices them)
Retrograde amnesia: inability to recall all info prior to trauma, often following closed head injury, relatively short duration.
Factors that aid in a patient remembering medical info
- their age
- their IQ
- greater/ better medical or technical info
- higher anxiety levels (leads to improved memory but reduces capacity to solve problems)
Patients are more likely to remember info/ instructions given to them when
• Information at the start or at the end of consultation (primacy / recency effect). • Statements perceived to be important.
• When the total amount of information provided is less.
• When short words and sentences are used.
• When the material is organised e.g. into categories.
• When material is repeated.
• When instructions are explicit and concrete (e.g. use of practical examples).
Info is remembered best when one
Recalls info after it is stored (practice) and it is remembed best wgen it is interpreted according to ones own schema?
