Long Term Memory

Question 1

What are explicit (declarative) memories

Answer 1

Knwodlge for events and facts

Question 2

What are implicit (non/declarative) memories

Answer 2

Memories of how to performed behaviours

Question 3

Episodic memory explanation

Answer 3

Type of explicit memory which included memories of personal experiences (eg first day of school). They include details of the event, context and emotions. They require a conscious effort to retrieve them and are time stamped. Associated with the hippocampus

Question 4

Semantic memory explanation

Answer 4

Type of explicit memory which includes knwodlge facts and concepts. Eg London is the capital of England. Semantic memories are not time stamped and require conscious recall. Associated with the temporal lobe.

Question 5

Procedural memory

Answer 5

Implicit memory about how to perform certain tasks, actions of skills such as riding a bike. They are acquired by practice and repetition. Associated with cerebellum and motor cortex.
DO NOT require conscious recall

Question 6

Evaluation diff types of LTM

Answer 6

Brain scans provide support for the different types of LTM. Research has shown that different parts of the brain are active when accessing episodic, semantic and procedural memory. Episodic memory has been associated with the hippocampus and temporal lobe; semantic memory is also associated with the temporal lobe; and procedural memory is associated with the cerebellum and motor cortex. Brain scan research suggests that different brain regions are responsible for the different types of LTM, supporting the idea that our LTM is made up of at least three distinct categories.

Question 7

Evaluation implicit VS explicit

Answer 7

Support for the distinction between implicit and explicit LTM comes from the case study of patient HM
(Milner, 1962). Patient HM suffered from severe epilepsy and underwent surgery, which involved the removal of his hippocampus, to alleviate the symptoms. His STM remained intact; however, he was unable to transfer certain types of information to his LTM. Milner discovered that HM was able to learn procedural (implicit) tasks, but not episodic or semantic (explicit) information. HM was able to learn a mirror-tracing task, where you copy an image while looking in a mirror, and retain the skill without forgetting. However, he had no knowledge of ever previously completing the mirror-tracing task.
Therefore, HM was able to demonstrate his procedural memory through implicit behaviour, despite being unable to recall his experience explicitly.

Question 8

Evalutaion prac app

Answer 8

Understanding different types of memory allows for the development of helpful real world applications. Belleville et al. (2006) compared the performance of older people suffering with a mild cognitive impairment who received memory training with that of a control group who did not. It was found that participants in the experimental group performed better on a test of episodic memory. This suggests that being able to identify different types of LTM can provide psychologists with the opportunity to improve peoples’ lives though devising appropriate treatments.