CLOA studies

Question 1

What is a schema?

Answer 1

Schema, in social science, mental structures that an individual uses to organize knowledge and guide cognitive processes and behaviour. People use schemata (the plural of schema) to categorize objects and events based on common elements and characteristics and thus interpret and predict the world.

Question 2

What is a flashbulb memory?

Answer 2

vivid memories characterized by strong, persistent recollection and difficult to forget.

Question 3

What is emotion?

Answer 3

Emotion is a complex, cognitive phenomenon that causes physical and psychological changes which impact behaviour and thought.

Question 4

Flashbulb studies:

Answer 4

Brown & Kulik (1977), Sharot et al (2007)

Question 5

Brown & Kulik (1977)

culture on emotion
memory on emotion
flashbulb memories

Answer 5

• 40 Americans of European descent and 40 Americans of African-American descent
• aged between 20-60 years old
• asked about whereabouts and any other details of when they heard that a collection of 8 US leaders and 1 Spanish leader had died.
• Additionally, the African-American participants had stronger recollections of the deaths of civil rights leaders such as Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, while the European Americans had stronger memories about the deaths of leaders of European descent.

Question 6

What is memory?

Answer 6

Memory can be defined as an active information-processing system that receives, stores, organises, alters and retrieves information.

Question 7

How does reliability affect memory?

Answer 7

The reliability of memory has been shown to be influenced by various environmental factors, including perception, beliefs, past experiences, context and cultural background.

Question 8

Memory reliability studies:

Answer 8

Loftus and Palmer (1974), Yuile and Cutshall (1986)

Question 9

What is reconstructive memory?

Answer 9

Reconstructive memory is a theory of memory recall, in which the act of remembering is influenced by various other cognitive processes including perception, imagination, semantic memory and beliefs, amongst others.

Question 10

Biasese & Thinking and Decision Making studies!

Answer 10

Kruger et al 2004

Englich and Mussweiler (2001) - anchoring bias

Question 11

Multistore memory model

Answer 11

A structural model that suggests three storage systems (places); Sensory Store, Short-Term Memory (STM), Long-Term Memory (LTM). Information moves through these systems under the control of various cognitive processes (attention, rehearsal, etc.).

Question 12

Working Memory Model Studies

Answer 12

Landry & Bartling (2011) - multitasking groups

Aim: Investigate the effects of “multi-tasking” when both tasks utilize the same working memory system - in this case, the phonological loop

Procedure

Participants were randomly divided into two groups - the “multi-tasking” group and the “single-task” group
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All participants were shown 10 letter strings, each consisting of 7 random letters (eg. GHKALKE). Participants had to memorize each string of letters, then write their answer down on an answer sheet
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The participants in the “multi-tasking” group were also told to repeatedly say the numbers “1” and “2” at a rate of two numbers per second, while they were trying to memorize the string of random letters
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Findings

The participants in the “multi-tasking” group performed significantly worse, recalling the letters with 45% accuracy compared with 76% in the “single task” group
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Conclusion

Repeating the numbers “1” and “2” made it more difficult to mentally rehearse the string of letters, resulting in diminished memory
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