3.6 - Discourse Memory Flashcards
What is Surface Representation?
The exact words of the discourse
You need to remember the exact words in order to recognize the correct answer
What are the three levels where we store discourse memory?
Surface Representation
Propositional Representation
Situational Model
The Surface Representation is held in WM ______ then it ______.
Just long enough for us to understand the sentence
Is forgotten
What are the two types of Propositional Representations?
Explicit Propositions
Implicit Propositions
What are Explicit Propositions?
Basic ideas
Those actually stated
What are Implicit Propositions?
Inferred information
Ideas that were inferred
In the following sentence, what information is explicit and what is inferred?
She was excited about the birthday party. After blowing out the candles, she opened the gifts.
Explicit: Blowing out candles
Implicit: There was a birthday cake
Both explicit and implicit propositions are stored together in ______.
Long term memory
What did Kintsch do in his 1974 cigarette experiment?
He had Subjects read sentences that were either explicit or implicit
After reading the sentences, the subjects were asked: “Did a discarded cigarette start the fire?”
Subjects were either asked immediately after reading the sentences or after a delay.
(Explicit: A carelessly disgarded burning cigarette started a fire. The fire destroyed many acres of virgin forest.)
(Implicit: A burning cigarette was carelessly disgarded. The fire destroyed many acres of virgin forest.)
How did the subjects respond in Kintsch’s 1974 cigarette experiment when there was NO delay? Why?
Subjects with the explicit sentences responded more quickly than those who recieved the implicit sentence.
The exact words were still in working memory.
How did the subjects respond in Kintsch’s 1974 cigarette experiment when there after a delay? Why?
Both groups of subjects responded at the same speed. There was no response time difference. (This meant the explicit group slowed down.)
Information was now stored in long term memory
What is the Situational Model?
Holds the visual model of the discourse (like a “mental movie”)
What was Bransford et al’s 1972 experiment with the turtle sentences?
Subjects read one of the following sentences:
- Three turtles rested on a floating log & a fish swam beneath them
- Three turtles rested beside a floating log & a fish swam beneath them.
Later the subjects were given a recognition test. Did you read the sentence: “A fish swam beneath a floating log”?
What did Bransford et al find in their 1972 experiment with the turtle sentences? Why?
Subjects who read the first sentence (turtles on the log) were more likely to mistake that they had read this sentence
Because the situational models for the sentences matched.
What did Kintsch et al want to look at in their 1990 experiment (Jack sentences)?
The strength of these three different memory representations
What did Kintsch et al do in their 1990 experiment (Jack sentences)?
Subjects read a paragraph and took a recognition test
The recognition test that had careful crafted questions that were either:
- The Actual Sentence: Jack scanned the newspaper
- A Surface Change: Jack looked through the newspaper
- A Proposition Change: Jack looked through the movie ads
- A Situational Change: Jack looked over some editorials
In Kintsch et al’s 1990 experiment (Jack sentences)…
How did subjects do on the recognition test when there was a surface change? Immediately? 40 minutes later? 4 days later?
Immediately: Perfect
40 minutes: Less good
4 days: Terrible
In Kintsch et al’s 1990 experiment (Jack sentences)…
How did subjects do on the recognition test when there was a propositional change? Immediately? 40 minutes later? 4 days later?
Immediately: Pretty good
40 mintues: Pretty lousy
4 days: Awful
In Kintsch et al’s 1990 experiment (Jack sentences)…
How did subjects do on the recognition test when there was a situational change? Immediately? 40 minutes later? 4 days later?
Immediately: Good
40 minutes: Almost perfect
4 days: Remains almost perfect
In Kintsch et al’s 1990 experiment (Jack sentences)…
How did subjects do on the recognition test overall when there was no delay? Which types of changes were more affected by the delay?
With no delay memory is high at all levels
After a delay, surface and propositional memory gets words, but the situational memory stays strong.
