Memory Flashcards

Question

Long Term Memory

Answer 1

Unlimited capacity Information lost due to interference more than decay Encoding: - Elaborative rehearsal - Levels of processing - Semantic is more effective than visual or acoustic processing (Craik & Tulving, 1975) - Self-referent effect - by viewing new info as relevant to the self, we consider that info more fully and are able to recall it

Answer 2

Unlimited Supporting evidence: - Penfields neural stimulation - Permanent storage? - Flashbulb memories (Brown & Kulick, 1977); Assassinations study (Talarico & Rubin, 2003); etc.

Answer 3

Vivid detailed memories that people have of certain dramatic world events (e.g. death of princess Diana, Kennedy assassination) Brown and Kulick (1977): - Argued that flashbuld memories are different from other memories in their longevity, accuracy and reliance on a special neural mechanism

Answer 4

Bohannon (1988) - The Challenger Disaster: - 2 weeks later recall was reduced to 77%, by 8 months 58% - Decays like normal memory - Stored in LTM, especially as it includes a strong emotional cue - Amygdala (emotion centre of the brain) is used in laying down LTM Criticism/Arguments: - Conway et al. (1994) - Talarico & Rubin (2003)

Answer 5

Argued that Bohannon's study did not use an event that people felt impacted on their lives He looked at the resignation af Margaret Thatcher in 1990 Flashbulb memories present in 86% of British participants compared with only 29% of European participants Suggests that Bohannon's findings were due to a lack of emotional attachment to the event

Answer 6

On the day after the event occurred, they asked 54 students to record their memories of the 9/11 attack, as well as recording a recent everday event Participants were tested over 1, 6 or 32 weeks Flashbulb memories decayed the same as everyday memories Ratings for belief in accuracy, vividness and recollection only declined for the everyday memory Participants "felt" that the flashbulb memory was stronger

Answer 7

Conway (1994) suggest it depends on: - Prior knowledge, personal importance, surprise and emotion, and overt rehearsal Deep levels of processing and elaborative rehearsal can mean that the events surrounding the tradgedy become more salient

Answer 8

A technique for transferring information into long-term memory by thinking about it in a deeper way

Answer 9

Semantic is more effective than visual or acoustic processing Craik & Tulving (1975)

Answer 10

By viewing new info as relevant to the self, we consider that info more fully and are better able to recal it

Answer 11

Explicit/Declaritive memory - Two types of declarative memory: - Semantic - Episodic Autobiographical memory Implicit/Procedural Memory

Answer 12

Type of LTM A memory that requires conscious recollection of information/a memory you can explain Two types of declarative memory: - Semantic - Episodic

Answer 13

A type if declarative memory Do not relate to a particular place or tiem General encyclopaedic knowledge of the world and language For example: meaings, relationships, rules, procedures, concepts, etc.

Answer 14

A type of declarative memory Memories for episodes or events in our lives For example: First day of school, GCSE results day, etc. They are all events that occur at a particular place and time For example, autobiographical memories are episodic memories

Answer 15

"Memory for events in ones life" Similar to episodic memories in that it is about life events Different to episodic memories - everday events, such as what you had for lunch yesterday, are unlikely to be included as autobiographical memory - They must include some emotional response Rubin, Wetzler & Nebes (1986) - Memories across the lifespan Self Memory System - Conway & Playdell-Pearce (2000)

Answer 16

Infantile amnesia - lack of memories prior to 3 years old Reminiscence bump - surprisingly large number of memories coming from between the ages of 10 and 30 when over 40 Retention for memories up to 20 years old with older memories being less likely to be recalled

Answer 17

Conway and Pleydell-Pearce (2000) Tried to narrow down what is special about autobiographical memory and how it might function: - Contains an autobiographical knowledge base and the current goals of the working self - Autobiographical knowledge contains info about lifetime periods and general events - Working self - set of LTM schemas about the self which are in operation at any one time in a similar manner to working memory

Answer 18

Non-conscious memory "...is revealed when performance on a task is facilitated in the absence of conscious recollection" - Graf & Schacter (1985) "knowing how..." Refers to learned skills, for example, juggling, riding a bike, walking These can become automated and require little attention (automaticity)

Answer 19

Process that controls flow of information from long term to working memory store

Answer 20

The types of memory elicited through the conscious retrieval of recollections in response to direct questions - Recall tests: subject must reproduce information - Free recall: Cued recall

Answer 21

Tip of the tongue phenomenon: Recognising someone's name is possible even when unable to recall the name - Brown & McNeil (1966) Number of cues: More cues for recognition tasks Marginal knowledge - Cantor et al. (2014) - Can only be retrieved when given an appropriate memory cue

Answer 22

Are memories reconstructions influenced by new information? Barlett memory research (1932) Loftus and Palmer (1974)

Answer 23

War of the Ghosts (Serial recall) Memories shaped to conform to our personal beliefs Memories recalled are not copies, but reconstructions

Answer 24

A failure in retrieval Cannot recall the word, but can recall words of a similar form or meaning Brown and McNeil (1966) - Subjects given definitions to low-frequency words - Attempt to recall word associated with definition Recall can be guided by partial word info

Answer 25

PPs watch video of car collisions at different speeds Asked "How fast were the cars travelling when they ____ into each other?" Recalled speed influenced by the verb used (i.e. hit, smashed) Recollection of the visual scene (i.e. broken glass) also affected

Answer 26

Godden & Baddeley (1975) Free-recall experiment: - Divers learned words from lists in two natural environments: dry land and underwater - Words recalled in location of learning, or the alternative Lists learned underwater are recalled better underwater, and vice versa

Answer 27

Often, we do not even encode the features necessary to 'remember' an object/event (i.e. details on a coin) Do we forget what we were told, or not encode the information in enough detail?

Answer 28

Memory traces arode with the passage of time - Jenkins & Dallenbach (1924): - Examined memory recall of non-existing syllables - Recall better after sleep - Emphasis on 'interference' rather than 'decay' This is no longer a valid theory of forgetting in LTM - Lack of physiological evidence for LTM's decaying - Older memories are not forgotten first

Answer 29

Some memories 'interfere' with other memories Interference is stronger when material is similar Two types of interference: 1) Proactive interference - Interference when retrieving new memories 2) Retroactive interference - Interference when retrieving old memories

Answer 30

Old memories interfere with ability to remember new memories For example: - Knowledge of the boundaries on a tennis court (may forget the boundaries of the court are larger in doubles if you are used to playing singles)

Answer 31

New memories interfere with ability to remember old memories

Answer 32

A lot of our early knowledge about memory comes from patient case studies, such as H.M. or Clive Wearing

Answer 33

Milner, Corkin and Teuber (1968) Became amnesic in 1953 following a bilateral removal in the hippocampal zone (failed attempt at curing his epilepsy) - Can remember childhood events (Scoville & Milner, 1957) - Memory generally poor for events after the operation "everyday is alone in itself, whatever enjoyment I've had, whatever sorrow I've had" (p. 217) - Milner, Corkin & Teuber (1968)

Answer 34

British musician and conductor Acute and long-lasting case of anterograde and retrograde amnesia - This means he lacks both the ability to form new memories and to recall some aspects of his past memories Herpes virus attacked CNS damaging his hippocampus He "wakes up" every 20 sec. and has no knowledge of ever learning music, but he can still play pian

Answer 35

This has been studied a lot Alcohol related problem in metabolizing the vitamin thiamine, which leads to brain damage in areas of the hippocampus and diencephalon, resulting in loss of episodic memory But, the amnesia from Korsakoffs is "less pure" as there is also subtle damage to other areas including frontal lobes - Cermak (1976) Gradual onset and more widespread damage makes it harder to interpret findings

Answer 36

Gradual onset Widespread brain damage Inconsistent in which areas of the brain are affected Brain plasticity

Answer 37

Retrograde amnesia Anterograded amnesia

Answer 38

Particularly affects episodic memories compared with semantic memories - Spiers et al. (2001) Usually associated with damage to cortical and noecortical structures Inability to recall information/events from before the critical incident Often can occur with anterograde amnesia Retrograde amnesia without anterograde amnesia is called Focal Retrograde Amnesia Seems to be a problem in retrieval of information Assessment is difficult - what questions can we ask to test this? Less work on this as it is less common Kapur, Young, Bateman & Kennedy (1989) Russell (1935) Temporal gradient of amnesia = Ribots's law

Answer 39

Problem with consolidation of memories - Isaac & Mayes (1999) Could be caused by damage to subcortical areas

Answer 40

Patient (E.D.) examined 5 years after diagnosis of retrograde amnesia Selective deficit for public figures/events in the past 20-30 years (but fine on famous cars) No anterograde amnesia EEG - Temporal lobe abnormality No structural lesion or dementia

Answer 41

Shrinking retrograde amnesia Older memories return before more recent ones (See consolidation)

Answer 42

Temporal gradient of amnesia = Ribot's law Ribot's law states that recent memories are more likely to be lost than the more remote memories This is the typical finding for retrograde amnesia Butters and Cermak (1986)

Answer 43

PZ - experimental psychologist, completed memoirs before contracting Korsakoff Memoirs enabled estimation of events and of how long he had known people The earlier the info had occurred, the better recall he had from it

Answer 44

The temporal gradient of retrograde amnesia and the link to hippocampus damage led to theories about how memories might be consolidated Consolidation: - Is this process in the brain that makes the memory for an event enduring - It refers to the process of info being transferred from one region of the brain to another and gradual re-organisation of brain regions to support memory - Maybe recent memories (before incident) are less consolidated

Answer 45

A number of models (including the Standard Model by Squire, Cohen and Nadel, 1984) All argue that retrograde amnesia is due to problems with consolidation 2 broad processes: - Hippocampal consolidation - Systems consolidation The central idea is that LTM are stored in the cortex (outer layer of the brain) via some form of trace Forming the trace takes time as different cortical sites cannot initially communicate The hippocampus acts as a temporary memory and also then facilitates communication between different sites in the cortex to enable a cortical trace to be established that supports the memory The interaction between the hippocampus and (neo)cortical regions is therefore crucial in supporting the formation of memories Continued activation (offline or through rehearsal) of these memories graduall enables these different cortical sites to communicate The process of consolidation then continues in cortical areas, but the hippocampus is no longer needed - Ribot's law

Memory Flashcards

(69 cards)