L23 - Declarative memory

Question 1

What are the 4 stages of memory?

Answer 1

Encoding (learning)

Consolidation

Storage

Retrieval

Question 2

For learning that takes minutes-hours, where is this occurring in the brain.

Answer 2

Synaptic level

(cellular level)

Question 3

For learning that takes days to years, where is this occurring in the brain.

Answer 3

At the system level

(reorganisation of related brain regions, slow dynamic process)

Question 4

What are the two types of declarative memory (explicit memory)?

Answer 4

Episodic memory (events)

Semantic memory (facts)

Question 5

What are the 4 types of memory?

Answer 5

Sensory

Short-Term and Working

Long-Term Nondeclarative

Long-Term Declarative

Question 6

What is the capacity of short-term and working memory?

Answer 6

7 +/- 2

Question 7

Which types of memory are conscious

Answer 7

Short-Term and Working

Long-Term Declarative

Question 8

Which types of memory are unconscious?

Answer 8

Long-Term Nondeclarative

Sensory

Question 9

Which types of memory gets lost primarily through decay?

Answer 9

Sensory

Short-Term and Working

Question 10

Which type of memory gets lost primarily through interference?

Answer 10

Long-Term Nondeclarative

Long-Term Declarative

Question 11

What is encoding in regards to memory?

Answer 11

The first stage of memory: the processing of incoming information that creates memory traces.

Question 12

What is the term used to describe the information transfer from a sensory buffer to STM?

Answer 12

Acquisition

Question 13

What is the term used for the stabilisation of a memory representation (transition to LTM)?

Answer 13

Consolidation

Question 14

What is (memory) storage?

Answer 14

The result of acquisition and consolidation. Storing of memories for later retrieval.

Question 15

What is retrieval?

Answer 15

Accessing stored information

(i.e. conscious representation or execution of a learned behaviour)

Question 16

What part of H.M’s brain did surgeons remove?

Why?

Answer 16

Most of his hippocampus

To prevent life-threatening seizures

Question 17

What disorder did H.M. suffer from following his procedure?

What did this do to him?

Answer 17

Heavy anterograde amnesia

Temporally graded retrograde amnesia (1-2 years before can’t remember)

He was unable to form new explicit memories.

Question 18

What part of the brain plays a crucial role in the formation of new declarative memories?

Answer 18

hippocampus

Question 19

Explain in three steps the Standard Consolidation Theory of how we form long term memories

Answer 19

1. Hippocampus rapidly encodes information
2. Transferred slowly to cortex over repeated trials.
3. Direct connections in cortex replace indirect connections via hippocampus until a unified representation is held.

(red = necessary connections, grey = unnecessary connections)

Question 20

Where is all LTM information stored?

Answer 20

In the cortex

Question 21

You see activation in the hippocampus when retrieving true LTM.

True or False

Answer 21

False

The brain eventually adapts to become independent of the hippocampus when it is stored in LTM

Question 22

What does this image represent?

Answer 22

The declarative memory process

Question 23

Everything to the right of the entorhinal cortex is part of the ____

Answer 23

hippocampus

Question 24

What two regions of the brain in this image are most important for encoding?

Answer 24

CA3 and CA1

Question 25

Where does retrieval occur in this image?

Answer 25

Typically occurs within CA3

then driving through CA1

then feeds it back into the cortex to activate those areas of the cortex where memory is stored.

Question 26

What is the process that the hippocampus uses to learn?

Answer 26

An error learning process.

(differentiating the situation relevant information and how the information differs from current inputs)

Question 27

Encoding and retrieval are unique and independent from one another within the hippocampus

True or False

Answer 27

False

Both regions are connected and dynamic

Question 28

What is the old/new effect test?

Answer 28

Participants see a series of images, then they are shown a different series of images and asked to identify which images they saw previously.

Question 29

For ERP in memory, do you get early or late differences and are they negative or positive effects?

Answer 29

Late positivity affects

Question 30

What are some problems with the standard model of memory?

Answer 30

It does not treat different forms of declarative memory differently

Research suggests the hippocampus is always involved in the recollection of episodic memory regardless of age.

Clinical cases suggest that episodic and semantic memory are organised differently for LTM

Question 31

What does Multiple Trace Theory say about how memories are stored?

Answer 31

Memories are stored in the hippocampus and the extra-hippocampal circuits.

Memories are encoded in these hippocampal-cortical networks and reactivation leads to multiple traces in the hippocampus.

Question 32

According to Multiple Trace Theory (MTT), what is the difference that memory traces in the cortex have compared to memory traces in the hippocampus?

Answer 32

Memory traces in the hippocampus have temporal context.

Traces in the cortex are context-free and become more semantic.

(We tend to have a gist of what happened in older memories as they become more semantic)

Question 33

How is the standard model of memory and multiple trace theory similar?

Answer 33

Both say that the reactivation of memories lead to a process of reorganization.

Question 34

Where does the standard models of memory and multiple trace theory (MTT) differ?

Answer 34

Where the reactivation and reorganization of memories happen.

MTT believes it is the hippocampus

Standard believes it is the cortex

Question 35

Why does MTT believe that episodic memory is in the hippocampus and extra-hippocampal circuits?

Answer 35

Because as memories turn into LTM in the cortex they become more semantic.

Semantic memories can be independent of the hippocampus circuits (like standard model)

Question 36

What does MTT think should happen if a hippocampus is removed?

Answer 36

All traces of episodic should be gone.

But semantic memories should be spared.

Question 37

What are some of the problems with Multiple Trace Theory (MTT)?

Answer 37

1. Fear conditioning in rats shows the size of the lesion is unrelated to retrograde memory gradient.
2. While the hippocampus is always involved in the recollection of memories, this may be in connection with other cortical areas.