Ch. 5

Question 1

What is memory?

Answer 1

An information-processing system that works constructively to encode, store, and retrieve information.

Question 2

What are memory’s three basic tasks?

Answer 2

1. Encoding
2. Storage
3. Access/retrieval

Question 3

How do we form memories?

Answer 3

Each of the three memory stages encodes and stores memories in a different way, but all three work together to transform sensory experience into a lasting record that has a pattern or meaning.

Question 4

What are the three stages of memory?

Answer 4

1. Sensory memory
2. Working memory
3. Long-term memory

Question 5

What is the capacity of sensory memory?

Answer 5

Storage capacity is 12+, but we typically encode only 3-4 items there.

Question 6

What is chunking?

Answer 6

Organizing pieces of information into smaller numbers of meaningful units; increases memory mileage

Question 7

Information is repeated or reviewed to keep it from fading

Answer 7

Maintenance Rehearsal

Question 8

Information is actively reviewed and related to information already in long term memory

Answer 8

Elaborating Rehearsal

Question 9

What makes you more likely to remember something?

Answer 9

Deeper level processing (like associating a picture with a thought)

Question 10

What are schemas?

Answer 10

Clusters of knowledge in semantic memory that give us a context for understanding events; make new events meaningful; speeds up processing

Question 11

Inability to form new memories

Answer 11

Anterograde Amnesia

Question 12

Inability to remember information previously stored in memory

Answer 12

Retrograde Amnesia

Question 13

What are the brain parts associated with long term memory?

Answer 13

Hippocampus, amygdala, cerebral cortex, cerebellum

Question 14

Process by which short-term memories become long-term memories over a period of time

Answer 14

Consolidation

Question 15

How do we retrieve memories?

Answer 15

Whether memories are implicit or explicit, successful retrieval depends on how they were encoded and how they are cued.

Question 16

Implicit means…

Answer 16

Learning something without the intent to

Question 17

Explicit memory requires…

Answer 17

Attention and awareness!

Question 18

Providing cues that stimulate memories without awareness of the connection between the cue and the retrieved memory

Answer 18

Priming

Question 19

Gist-the sense of meaning as contrasted with exact details

Answer 19

Meaningful organization

Question 20

Retrieval method in which one must reproduce previously presented information (like a test)

Answer 20

Recall

Question 21

Retrieval method in which one must identify present stimuli as having been previously presented

Answer 21

Recognition

Question 22

Memories are encoded with specific cues related to the context in which they were formed

Answer 22

Encoding Specificity Principle

Question 23

A memory process that selectively retrieves memories that match one’s mood

Answer 23

Mood-Congruent Memory

Question 24

Aspect of memory that enables one to remember to take some action in the future

Answer 24

Prospective memory

Question 25

Inability to recall a word known to be in one’s memory

Answer 25

Tip-of-the-tongue Phenomenon

Question 26

One item prevents us from forming a robust memory for another item

Answer 26

Interference

Question 27

The impermanence of a long-term memory; long-term memories gradually fade in strength over time

Answer 27

Transience

Question 28

What does Ebbinghaus’s Forgetting curve show?

Answer 28

Savings demonstrated by relearning drops rapidly and reaches a plateau, below which little more is forgotten

Question 29

Forgetting caused by lapses in attention

Answer 29

Absent-Mindedness

Question 30

Forgetting that occurs when an item in memory cannot be accessed or retrieved

Answer 30

Blocking

Question 31

Memory fault that occurs when memories are retrieved, but are associated with the wrong time, place, or person

Answer 31

Misattribution

Question 32

Process of memory distortion as the result of deliberate or inadvertent suggestion

Answer 32

Suggestibility

Question 33

An attitude, belief, emotion, or experience that distorts memories

Answer 33

Bias

Question 34

Memory problem in which unwanted memories cannot be put out of mind

Answer 34

Persistence

Question 35

What are the seven sins of memory?

Answer 35

Transience, absent-mindedness, blocking, misattribution, suggestibility, bias, persistence

Question 36

Techniques for improving memory, especially by making connections between new material and information already present in long-term memory

Answer 36

Mnemonics