Long-term Memory Flashcards
enterograde amnesia
impairement of memory for events that occurred after the onset of amnesia
retrograde amnesia
impairment of memory for events that occurred before the onset of amnesiaC
Causes of amnesia
surgery, infections like herpes, head injury or stroke, conditions, Korsakoff syndrome
the structure of the LTM system
First divided into explicit (declarative) memory and implicit (non-declarative) memory
Declarative: episodic memory and semantic memory
Non-declarative: procedural memory, priming and conditioner associations & reflexes
episodic memory
the ability to learn, store, and retrieve information about unique personal experiences that occur in daily life.
semantic memory
factual knowledge about the world (e.g. the capital of Norway)
Procedural skills/habits
automatic motor behaviour, which can be rapidly executed with little attention. Including cognitive skills like reading and once acquired it can be rapidly executed with little attention. E.g. driving & tying shoelaces
Conditioned associations
response triggered by a (learned) stimulus; e.g. via classical or operant conditioning
Priming
identification or production of an item is improved by an earlier encounter, i.e exposure to a stimulus affects the subsequent response.
perceptual priming
takes place when stimuli have similar forms. For example, the word “goat” will provoke a fast response when it is near the word “boat” because the two words are perceptually similar.
conceptual priming
Conceptual priming involves a stimulus and response that are conceptually related. Words such as “seat” and “chair” are likely to show priming effects because they are in the same conceptual category.
prospective memory
a form of memory that involves remembering to perform a planned action or recall a planned intention at some future point in time.
Intensions can be pulses (time-locked, e.g. at Tuesday 5pm) or steps (wider time frame, e.g. sometime this week)
autonoetic memories
within episodic memory. They are memories that are associated with a sense of self-awareness and that are relived during recollection
noetic memories
within episodic memory. Memory for facts, consists of facts about ourselves like the date we were born
involuntary memories
the unintentional recollection of past personal experiences.
False memories
the inaccurate recollections of events that did not occur or distortions of events that did occur
imagination inflation
the strengthening of a false memory through repeated retrieval
Misinformation effect
This phenomenon occurs when people’s memories for an event are influenced by misleading information presented to them after the event has occurred.
Loftus & Palmer study
investigated the influence of language on eyewitness memory and the reliability of testimony. Participants were shown a video of a car accident and then asked questions about the event, including a critical question about the speed of the vehicles. Different groups of participants were asked questions using different verbs, such as “smashed,” “collided,” “bumped,” or “hit”. The results showed that the verb used in the question influenced participants’ estimates of the speed of the cars, with those who heard more intense verbs like “smashed” estimating higher speeds compared to those who heard less intense verbs. This study demonstrated the phenomenon of “misinformation effect,”
Mirror drawing task
involves tracing shapes while looking at their reflection in a mirror, requiring individuals to adapt to reversed movements. It’s used in amnesia research to study procedural memory, which remains intact in some cases of amnesia despite impaired episodic memory.
