Chapter 7: Reliability of Memory Part 2

Question 1

How does damage to the amygdala affect short-term memory?

Answer 1

Tends not to affect STM

Question 2

How does damage to the amygdala affect semantic (explicit) memory?

Answer 2

• Can remember long-term semantic memories
• Can’t remember or recall facial features
• Little memory of emotionally arousing events

Question 3

How does damage to the amygdala affect episodic (explicit) memory?

Answer 3

• Can remember long-term episodic memories
• Little memory of emotionally arousing events
• Can’t recall facial features

Question 4

How does damage to the amygdala affect procedural (implicit) memory?

Answer 4

Barely affects procedural memory

Question 5

How does damage to the amygdala affect classically conditioned (implicit) memory?

Answer 5

• Typically unable to acquire a conditioned fear response

- Abolishes all signs of fear to an unlearned or previously learned stimulus

Question 6

How does damage to the cerebral cortex affect short-term memory?

Answer 6

Damage to the frontal lobe interferes with the efficiency of transfer of info from sensory to STM

Question 7

How does damage to the cerebral cortex affect semantic (explicit) memory?

Answer 7

Injury in the left hemisphere affects recall of verbal material (Eg. Names)

Question 8

How does damage to the cerebral cortex affect episodic (explicit) memory?

Answer 8

If consolidation of these memories has occurred they can still be repressed.
-Right frontal lobe is activated when retrieving episodic memories moreso than the left lobe, while the left frontal lobe is more involved in encoding episodic memories

Question 9

How does damage to the cerebellum affect classically conditioned (implicit) memory?

Answer 9

Without the cerebellum, individuals are unable to store long-term memory of conditioned reflexes, where all components of the conditioned response to the CS are abolished but there is no effect on the reflex itself.
-Cannot acquire classically conditioned responses.

Question 10

How does damage to the cerebellum affect procedural (implicit) memory?

Answer 10

Causes severely impaired spatial learning and memory, where an individual’s ability to organise and execute complex and effective exploration behaviours are affected.

Question 11

What is Alzheimer’s disease?

Answer 11

A type of dementia characterised by the gradual widespread degeneration of brain neurons, progressively causing memory decline, deterioration of cognitive and social skills, and personality changes.

Question 12

List 4 biological effects on the brain of an individual with AD:

Answer 12

• Amyloid plaques
• Neurofibrillary tangles
• Brain size
• Amount of neurotransmitter acetylcholine

Question 13

What are amyloid plaques and how are they affected by AD?

Answer 13

Are fragments of the protein called beta amyloid that the body produces normally.

• In a healthy brain, they are broken down and eliminated naturally
• In a brain with AD, the fragments accumulate over time to form clumps of hard, insoluble plaques outside and around the neurons, thereby impairing synapses and inhibiting communication between neurons.

Question 14

What are neurofibrillary tangles and how are they affected by AD?

Answer 14

Look like twisted fibres and inhibit transport of essential substances throughout the neuron.
-The failure of the transport system is believed to eventually kill neurons.

Question 15

How is the level of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine (ACh) affected by AD?

Answer 15

• The brains of people with AD have greatly reduced levels of ACh.
• The amount of ACh in the brain decreases naturally as we age.
• With AD, it decreases much faster than normal
• It is believed that the build-up of amyloid and tau may destroy ACh transmitting neurons

Question 16

What is dementia?

Answer 16

An umbrella term used to describe a syndrome - a collection of symptoms associated with more than 100 different neurodegenerative diseases and other disorders that are characterised by the progressive decline in a person’s functioning.

Question 17

What does forgetting refer to?

Answer 17

The inability to access or recover info previously stored in memory.

Question 18

What is a retrieval cue? Give an example:

Answer 18

Any stimulus that assists the process of locating and recovering info stored in memory.
Eg. You forget that you need a new pen, but when you try to write with the pen that’s run out ink you remember.

Question 19

Why is AD categorised as a neurodegenerative disease?

Answer 19

The loss of neurons in the brain worsens over time.

Question 20

Why is AD categorised as a form of dementia?

Answer 20

There is a loss of past explicit memories (retrograde amnesia) and difficulty in retaining newly learned info (anterograde amnesia).

Question 21

What is are context-dependent cues? Give an example:

Answer 21

Environmental cues in the specific situation (‘context’) where a memory has formed that act as retrieval cues to help access the memories formed in the context.
Eg. Walking into a room and forgetting why you are there, but when you go back into your room you remember you were going to get a drink of water.

Question 22

What are state-dependent cues? Give an example:

Answer 22

Are associated with an individual’s internal psychological and physical state at the time the memory was formed, and act as retrieval cues to help access those memories.
Eg. If you learn info when you are happy, sad, intoxicated, or calm, that info is more likely to be retrieved when you are in that state.

Question 23

What is rehearsal? List its 2 main types:

Answer 23

The process of consciously manipulating info to keep it in STM, to transfer it to LTM or to aid storage and retrieval.
-Maintenance rehearsal and elaborative rehearsal

Question 24

What is maintenance rehearsal? Give an example:

Answer 24

Involves repeating the info being remembered over and over again so that is can be retained (or ‘maintained’) in STM.
Eg. Repeating a phone number out-loud

Question 25

What is elaborative rehearsal? Give an example:

Answer 25

The process of linking new info in a meaningful way with other new info or info already stored in LTM to aid in its storage and future retrieval from LTM.
Eg. Thinking of an example that links to the definition of elaborative rehearsal.

Question 26

Describe the serial position effect:

Answer 26

A finding that free recall is better for items at the end and the beginning of a list than for items in the middle of a list.
-The recall of items tends to be best for items at the end, and then the beginning, and worst for items around the middle.

Question 27

What is the primacy effect?

Answer 27

Describes the superior recall of items at the beginning of a list.
-Info has had time to be transferred to LTM.

Question 28

What is the recency effect?

Answer 28

Describes the superior recall of items at the end of a list.

- Info is still in STM (unless delay after learning occurs).