Learning and Memories

Question 1

HM

Answer 1

Henry Molaison
1953 - medial temporal lobe and hippocampus removed for epileptic seizures
Developed profound amnesia and couldn’t form new memories
Treatment produced memory impairments (Antergrade amnesia)
can repeat 7 numbers if no distractions but wouldn’t remember the task if distracted/the next day
could motor learn, perceptually learn
had an issue with ENCODING STM to LTM

Question 2

Anterograde and Retrograde Amnesia

Answer 2

Retrograde = can’t remember events prior to brain damage
Anterograde = can’t remember events after brain damage - unable to form declarative, only nondeclarative

Question 3

Sensory Memory

Answer 3

brief period of time that initial sensation of environmental stimuli is initially remembered
Length ranges from fractions of a second to few seconds

Question 4

Short-Term Memory

Answer 4

info from sensory memory if it’s meaningful or salient enough
seconds to minutes
rehearsal
capacity limited to a few items (chunking)

Question 5

Long-Term Memory

Answer 5

contains info from STM that’s consolidated
permanent
strengthened with increased retrieval
nondeclarative mem - implicit memory, includes memories that we aren’t conscious of, operates automatically and controls motor behaviours (riding a bike etc)
declarative mem - explicit memory, memory of events and facts we can think and talk about
episodic memories and semantic memories and spatial memories

Question 6

Human Eyelid Conditioning

Answer 6

eyelid can be classically conditioned
US is a puff of air to eye (causes blinking) and CS is an audio tone and CR is eyeblink

Question 7

Conditioned Tolerance

Answer 7

Crowell, Hinson and Seigel 1981:
saline = no reaction
alcohol = hypothermia reduced due to alcohol tolerance

Question 8

Hebb’s Law

Answer 8

puff of air to eye picked up by neuron in somatosensory system, synapse P
1000Hz tone causes neuron in auditory system that links to synapse T
causes blink