Episodic and semantic memory Flashcards
What is episodic memory?
- Memory for specific events located at a specific point in time
- ‘mental time travel’
- Backward to relive earlier episodes
Look forward to anticipate and plan future events (e.g. you would imagine what a Sunday meal with your family looks like based on previous memory)
What is Semantic memory?
- Memory for fact
- No mental time travel
- E.g. word knowledge, vocabulary, rules etc.
- Short delay: information is recalled in episodes
Long delay: the same information is integrated into semantic memory
How are episodic and semantic memory functionally different?
- Different types of information
- Different experiences
What is neuropsychological evidence for the difference between semantic and episodic memory
147 cases of amnesia
- Substantial or even dramatic loss of episodic memory
- Semantic memory effects more variable and generally smaller
- Damage to the hippocampus (and the MTL) affects episodic memory far more than semantic memory
- BUT: hippocampal amnesia may affect acquisition of new semantic memories more than retrieval of old ones.
What are the different brain regions associated with episodic and semantic memory?
- Semantic memory: anterior frontal lobe, anterior temporal lobe
- Episodic deficit: amygdala, hippocampus
What is the difference between Bartlett’s approach compared to Ebbinghaus?
he stressed participants’ effort after meaning
What are Bartlett’s Schemas?
- Structured representation of knowledge about the world, events, people or actions
- Can be used to make sense of new material, to store and later recall them
- Are influenced/ determined by social and cultural factors
What are scripts?
knowledge about events and sequence of events/ actions e.g. actions in a coffee shop
What are frames?
fixed structural information e.g., how a coffee shop looks (organisation of the physical environment)
What do schemas appear to be universal to
people of a similar background
What was Bartlett’s ‘the war of the ghosts’ experiment?
- Native American folk tales shown to Western people
- People committed many errors and distortions when they asked to recall these
- In their recall they made the story more coherent and omitted details
- These distortions were more consistent with their own semantic knowledge
- Recalled stores were ‘westernised’
- Criticism: vague instructions
What is the role of meaning in memory?
- Ascribing meaning to stimuli affects encoding and storage
- Carmichael et al. (1932)
§ Shown the same pictures but with different labels
§ When asked to draw it later they drew something that looks more like their label
What is Paivio’s Dual-coding hypothesis?
- More imageable words (e.g. concrete nouns) are more memorable
- High imageability (church, beggar) have two routes of encoding:
§ Visual appearance
§ Verbal meaning - Low imageability (virtue ect.) only has one route of encoding
§ Verbal meaning - Multiple encoding routes improve the chance of successful recall
What is levels of processing theory (LOP)
- Input is processed in a variety of levels going from most shallow to deepest:
§ Visual (structure)
§ Phonological (acoustic)
§ Semantic (meaning) - Most information into long-term storage with deepest level of processing (semantic)
- deeper coding is better for memory
What are the Levels of Processing pros?
- Replicated in numerous studies (various encoding tasks)
- Affects both recognition and recall
- Incidental or not memory test
What are the Levels of Processing criticisms?
- Difficult to define and measure
§ Processing speed? - Levels of processing (features) are not processed in a serial order but simultaneously
- Other studies have found deeper processing is not always more memorable
What is the Transfer appropriate processing theory?
Memory retrieval is best when the cues available at testing are similar to those available at encoding
Can the LOP effect be explained in terms of the transfer appropriate processing (TAP_ theory?
Yes: deep encoding is more similar to the way the memory is tested
What is maintenance rehearsal and what is elaborative rehearsal?
- Maintenance rehearsal: as something was learned vs
Elaborative rehearsal: linking it to other material
Why is elaborative rehearsal better for memory?
Richer and more elaborate encoding leads to better memory
- Elaborative rehearsal enhances delayed long-term learning more than maintenance rehearsal
What is the hierarchical organisation theory?
Recall is better when words are organised rather than put in a random order
When are items often chunked together?
§ Linked to a common associate (e.g. syringe, point, knitting are all linked to needle)
§ Come from the same semantic category
§ Form a logical hierarchical structure or matrix
What are factors that aid encoding?
§ Create Connections (imagery, meaning)
§ Organisation (recall by groups, present in an organised way)
§ LOP/TAP (deeper processing, similar encoding – retrieval procedures)
Active creation (generate, test)
What are concepts?
mental representations and the fundamental units of thought e.g., concept of bird, animal ect.