Chapter 5

Question 1

Why is memory considered one of the most important faculties humans possess?

Answer 1

crucial for tasks ranging from basic survival instincts like remembering the meaning of traffic lights to complex professional duties like a doctor recalling medical knowledge stored in long-term memory.

Question 2

How many major memory systems do most researchers agree on?

Answer 2

three major memory systems:
working memory,
episodic memory,
semantic memory

Question 3

According to William James, what are primary memory and secondary memory?

Answer 3

Primary memory: (short-term memory STM) is where information is initially stored for conscious inspection
secondary memory: (long-term memory LTM) is a long-term storage unit for all other memories.

Question 4

What are the three interconnected memory systems proposed by Atkinson and Shiffrin’s modal model of memory?

Answer 4

consists of
sensory memory,
short-term memory, and
long-term memory,

Question 5

What is sensory memory, and what are its characteristics?

Answer 5

the initial processing of sensory information from the outside world, such as visual (iconic) or auditory (echoic) stimuli

It registers a large amount of information but typically decays quickly, with iconic memory lasting about one second and echoic memory lasting about two seconds.

Question 6

Describe George Sperling’s seminal experiment on sensory memory.

Answer 6

involved flashing participants a matrix of nine letters for a brief moment. In the partial report task, participants had to recall only one row of letters indicated by a tone, demonstrating the rapid decay of sensory memory.

Question 7

What is the capacity limit of short-term memory, according to George Miller?

Answer 7

between five and nine items, often referred to as the “magical number seven plus or minus two.”

Question 8

How does chunking enhance the capacity of short-term memory?

Answer 8

grouping pieces of information together, thereby reducing the total number of items to be remembered. For example, remembering a seven-digit sequence (e.g., 564-3247) as two chunks makes it easier to recall.

Question 9

What are the four distinct subsystems of Alan Baddeley’s working memory model?

Answer 9

central executive,
the phonological loop,
the visuo-spatial sketchpad,
the episodic buffer,

each responsible for different aspects of information processing and manipulation.

Question 10

What are the two main divisions of long-term memory, and what distinguishes them?

Answer 10

Long-term memory comprises declarative (explicit) - involves knowledge that can be stated, including episodic memory for personal experiences and semantic memory for general knowledge

non-declarative (implicit) memory - Non-declarative memory, on the other hand, includes memories that do not require conscious thought, such as procedural memory and priming effects.

Question 11

What are the differences between episodic and semantic memory, according to Endel Tulving?

Answer 11

Episodic memory involves personally experienced events or episodes, and are unique and tied to specific experiences

semantic memory deals with general knowledge about words, concepts, and their interrelations, and are more abstract and not tied to personal experiences.

Question 12

What neuropsychological evidence supports the theory that episodic and semantic memory are independent systems?

Answer 12

injuries or disorders like retrograde amnesia have shown that some pts lose have impaired episodic memory but have retained semantic memory

Question 13

What is procedural memory, and how does it differ from other forms of memory?

Answer 13

underlies rote skills and behaviors, such as riding a bicycle or playing an instrument.
operates implicitly, allowing individuals to perform tasks without necessarily being able to explain how they do so.

Question 14

What are priming effects, and how do they operate in memory?

Answer 14

Priming effects occur when exposure to a stimulus influences the response to a related stimulus, making the response faster and more accurate
Operates implicitly, often below the level of conscious awareness, and can be demonstrated through tasks such as lexical decision tasks or word fragment completion tasks.

Question 15

What is the Perceptual Representation System (PRS), and what is its role in memory?

Answer 15

a memory system hypothesized to contain specific representations of events, responsible for priming effects
Operates on a superficial level of information processing, distinct from the deeper processing of episodic memory
believed to facilitate the unconscious processing of stimuli, leading to priming effects.

Question 16

Describe the lexical decision task (LDT) and its significance in studying priming effects.

Answer 16

requires participants to determine whether a presented string of letters forms a word or not – used in priming experiments to measure the speed and accuracy of word recognition. Faster recognition of words indicates the presence of priming effects, providing insights into implicit memory processes.

Question 17

What is tacit knowledge, and how does it relate to procedural memory?

Answer 17

Refers to knowing how to do something without being able to explicitly describe it

closely related to procedural memory, as demonstrated in skills like riding a bike or playing a musical instrument.

While individuals may have tacit knowledge of these skills, they may struggle to articulate the specific processes involved.

Question 18

What is the butcher-on-the-bus phenomenon?
encounters or circumstances.

Answer 18

refers to knowing someone without remembering any previous encounters or circumstances.

Question 19

What is the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon (TOT)?

Answer 19

It’s the sensation of knowing something but being unable to recall it immediately.

Question 20

What did R. Brown and McNeill (1966) observe about TOT?

Answer 20

Participants experiencing TOTs could recall aspects of the target word, such as its first letter or number of syllables, and make judgments about similar words.

Question 21

What triggers TOTs according to Burke et al. (1991)?

Answer 21

TOTs occur more with less frequently used words, where the link between meaning and pronunciation may have weakened.

Question 22

How do older people experience TOTs differently according to Burke et al. (1991)?

Answer 22

They are more likely to experience TOTs with the names of famous people, possibly due to longer retention but weaker recall links.

Question 23

What is spreading activation?

Answer 23

It’s the idea that when a concept is activated in memory, the activation spreads to related concepts.

Question 24

How does spreading activation explain priming?

Answer 24

Activation of one concept primes related concepts, making them more easily retrievable.

Question 25

What is an involuntary semantic memory?

Answer 25

It’s when a semantic memory pops into mind without any accompanying episodic context.

Question 26

How do connectionist models represent memory?

Answer 26

They represent memories as patterns of activation in a network of interconnected nodes, rather than as stored copies of experiences.

Question 27

What is the associative deficit hypothesis proposed by Naveh-Benjamin (2000)?

Answer 27

It suggests that older adults have difficulty creating and retrieving links between individual units of information, leading to memory problems.

Question 28

What relevance did Schacter (1987) and Baddeley (1987a) point out regarding Korsakoff’s syndrome?

Answer 28

Korsakoff’s syndrome is relevant for studying memory, as it affects the ability to form new long-term memories.

Question 29

What is Korsakoff’s syndrome attributed to?

Answer 29

It is attributed to brain tissue atrophy resulting from malnutrition, particularly thiamine deficiency, often seen in chronic alcoholics.

Question 30

How do amnesic patients typically experience time, according to Talland (1968)?

Answer 30

Time seems to come to a stop for amnesic patients, as they are unable to remember events since the onset of their illness.

Question 31

How do Alzheimer’s patients typically experience semantic memory decline, according to Salmon, Butters, and Chan (1999)?

Answer 31

They experience deterioration in semantic memory organization, likely due to neurodegenerative changes in brain regions storing semantic representations.

Question 32

What are some rehabilitation strategies for memory impairment in Alzheimer’s patients?

Answer 32

Environmental adaptations, external memory aids like electronic organizers, and teaching domain-specific knowledge can help compensate for memory deficits.