Everyday memory and memory errors Flashcards
Two important characteristics of autobiographical memories are
(1)they are multidimensional and
(2)we remember some events in our lives better than others.
The empirical finding that people over 40 years old have enhanced memory for events from adolescence and early adulthood, compared to other periods of their lives.
reminiscence bump
The idea that memory is enhanced for events that occur as a person’s self-image or life identity is being formed. This is one of the explanations for the reminiscence bump.
self-image hypothesis
An explanation for the reminiscence bump, which states that memories are better for adolescence and early adulthood because encoding is better during periods of rapid change that are followed by stability.
cognitive hypothesis
The idea that events in a person’s life story become easier to recall when they fit the cultural life script for that person’s culture. This has been cited to explain the reminiscence bump.
cultural life script hypothesis
Tendency for the most notable public events in a person’s life to be perceived to occur when the person is young.
youth bias
A subcortical structure that is involved in processing emotional aspects of experience, including memory for emotional events.
amygdala
Memory for the circumstances that surround hearing about shocking, highly charged events. It has been claimed that such memories are particularly vivid and accurate
flashbulb memory
Recall that is tested immediately after an event and then retested at various times after the event.
Repeated recall
The idea that we remember some life events better because we rehearse them. This idea was proposed by Neisser as an explanation for “flashbulb” memories.
narrative rehearsal hypothesis
The idea that what people report as memories are constructed based on what actually happened plus additional factors, such as expectations, other knowledge, and other life experiences.
constructive nature of memory
The process by which people determine the origins of memories, knowledge, or beliefs. Remembering that you heard about something from a particular person would be an example of source monitoring.
source monitoring
Misidentifying the source of a memory.
source monitoring error
Occurs when the source of a memory is misidentified
source misattributions
unconscious plagiarism of the work of others
cryptomnesia,
Enhanced probability of evaluating a statement as being true upon repeated presentation.
illusory truth effect
The ease with which a statement can be remembered.
fluency
A method of measuring memory in which a person is asked to reproduce a stimulus on repeated occasions at longer and longer intervals after the original presentation of the material to be remembered.
repeated reproduction
Inference that occurs when reading or hearing a statement leads a person to expect something that is not explicitly stated or necessarily implied by the statement.
pragmatic inference
A person’s knowledge about what is involved in a particular experience.
schema
A type of schema. The conception of the sequence of actions that describe a particular activity. For example, the sequence of events that are associated with going to class would be a “going to class” script
script
Autobiographical memory capacity possessed by some people who can remember personal experiences that occurred on any specific day from their past.
highly superior autobiographical memory
Misleading information presented after a person witnesses an event that changes how the person describes that event later.
misinformation effect
The misleading information that causes the misinformation effect.
misleading postevent information (MPI)
Memories that have been pushed out of a person’s consciousness.
repressed childhood memory
Testimony by eyewitnesses to a crime about what they saw during commission of the crime.
eyewitness testimony
The tendency for eyewitnesses to a crime to focus attention on a weapon, which causes poorer memory for other things that are happening.
weapons focus
An increase in confidence of memory recall due to confirming feedback after making an identification, as in a police lineup.
post-identification feedback effect
A procedure used for interviewing crime scene witnesses that involves letting witnesses talk with a minimum of interruption. It also uses techniques that help witnesses recreate the situation present at the crime scene by having them place themselves back in the scene and recreate emotions they were feeling, where they were looking, and how the scene may have appeared when viewed from different perspectives.
cognitive interview
A memory that involves a sentimental affection for the past.
nostalgia
music-enhanced autobiographical memories (MEAMS)
Autobiographical memories elicited by hearing music.
Consistent with the narrative rehearsal hypothesis, a significant source of rehearsal and reflection of flashbulb memories may be due to ___.
media coverage and influence
Bartlett’s classic “War of the Ghosts” experiment is particularly noteworthy because it was one of the first to make use of ___.
repeated reproduction
The fact that autobiographical memories can include tactile elements demonstrates that these types of memories are ________.
multidimensional
The cognitive hypothesis for the reminiscence bump is related to which of the following processes?
a. inference
b. retrieval
c. reconsolidation
d. encoding
d. encoding
It is estimated that around ___ of all criminal cases where an individual was wrongly convicted of a crime involved eyewitness testimony.
three-fourths
Janelle is getting an fMRI scan while she describes an everyday episodic memory. Which of the following brain areas will show the LEAST activity in her scan?
a. hippocampus and parietal cortex
b. medial temporal lobe and amygdala
c. amygdala and hippocampus
d. parietal cortex and prefrontal cortex
amygdala and hippocampus
Wade wants to replicate the research that Cahill conducted with a person named B.P., who had suffered a neurological injury. Wade is looking to identify the role that ________ plays in memory.
a. emotion
b. culture
c. sensation
d. suggestion
a. emotion
Friends repeatedly sharing experiences of an event such as an earthquake in a major city can affect their memories due to which of the following?
a. inference
b. rehearsal
c. reconsolidation
d. saturation
b. rehearsal
Which of the following are the foundation of the illusory truth effect?
a. fluency and emotion
b. repetition and fluency
c. emotion and misattribution
d. misattribution and repetition
b. repetition and fluency
What is the key variable in the method known as repeated reproduction?
a. frequency
b. age
c. time
d. stress
c. time
The misinformation effect on memory is related to which of the following?
a. stress
b. timing
c. rehearsal
d. culture
b. timing
In the research conducted by Loftus and coworkers on the misinformation effect, how did the words “smash” and “hit” affect participants’ memory of seeing broken glass in the images presented?
About twice as many participants in the “smash” group remembered seeing broken glass.
When Marcus went into the vintage candy store, he couldn’t believe all the brands they sold. When he bit into a Turkish Taffy, it immediately took him back to hanging out with his pals at their tree fort on a summer day. What did Marcus experience at the store?
the Proust effect
