Long-term memory and consolidation

Question 1

episodic memory

Answer 1

• specific autobiographic event
• spatial and temporal context information
• “remember”
• repeated exposure may weaken

Question 2

semantic memory

Answer 2

• general facts and knowledge
• “know”
• can be strengthened by exposure

Question 3

3 stages of episodic and semantic memories

Answer 3

1. acquisition –> info must be encoded or but into memory
2. retention –> memory must be retained
3. recall –> memory must be retrieved when needed

Question 4

Factors affecting these stages

Answer 4

• easier to remember in context
• depth of processing
• recency effect –> consolidation period: new memories are vulnerable and easily lost (episodic & semantic)
• transfer appropriate processing –> recall is better if retrieval context similar to encoding context

Question 5

interference

Answer 5

• 2 memories overlap in content, strength of either or both memories may be reduced
  –> proactive interference: old info can disrupt new learning
  –> retroactive learning: new info can disrupt old learning

Question 6

source amnesia

Answer 6

• subtle memory failure that we all experience
• we remember fact or source but attribute it to the wrong source
  –> Cryptomnesia: person thinks current thoughts are original/new
• Boggle-like study

Question 7

false memory

Answer 7

• memories of events that never happened
• happens when people are prompted to imagine missing details

Question 8

Semantic memory storage

Answer 8

• Sensory cortex: somatosensory cortex, visual cortex, auditory cortex
• Association Cortex: links word with visual image with semantic memory
• Cortical damage: agnosia –> selective disruption of ability to process a particular kind of info
  –> loss of semantic knowledge linking perception of object with its identity

Question 9

Patient H.M

Answer 9

• had epileptic seizures -> they became debilitating
• removal of medial temporal lobe from hemisphere where the seizures originated cured epilepsy
• they removed medial temporal lobes bilaterally (hippocampus, amygdala)
  –> seizures declined but he developed retrograde amnesia (inability to form new semantic or episodic memories)

Question 10

Radial arm maze

Answer 10

• rat is placed in center and allowed to collect what it can, if rat enters an arm it has already visited it gets counted as error
• rat with hippocampal lesions make more errors

Question 11

Hippocampus

Answer 11

• critical for forming new memories
• encode info, retain or consolidate, retrieve it
  -> Subsequent forgetting paradigm: left medial temporal lobe is more active during initial learning of words that are subsequently remembered
• > only words activate the left part of the lobe
  -> depth of processing phenomenon: hippocampus is more active when both word and source were recalled
• binds together memory of objects with unique spatial and temporal context

Question 12

Retrograde amnesia

Answer 12

• loss of memory for events that occurred before brain damage

Question 13

Anterograde amnesia

Answer 13

• loss of ability to form new memories since injury (episodic and semantic)

Question 14

Memory consolidation

Answer 14

• stabilizes a memory trace after initial acquisition

Question 15

Synaptic consolidation

Answer 15

• longer strengthening of synaptic transmission
• late-phase long-term potention: form of plasticity that occurs within the first few hours after learning
  -> faster than system consolidation

Question 16

System Consolidation

Answer 16

• memories from hippocampus move to neo-cortex in more permanent form of storage
  1. first encoded and registered in hippocampus
  2. hippocampus teaches cortex to strengthen corticosteroids-cortical connection and making memory hippocampus-independent
  3. memory transferred to Neo-cortex

Question 17

multiple trace theory

Answer 17

• distinction between semantic and episodical memory
• hippocampus always involved in episodic memory (especially rentention and retrieval, less encoding)
• hippocampus provides spatial context
• semantic memories make use of other structures after consolidation
• predicts flat retrograde amnesia
• differences between semantic and episodic memories: episodic memories come first (not all semantic memories are episodic first)

Question 18

Explicit Memory

Answer 18

• A category of memory that includes semantic and episodic memory and consists of memories of which the person is aware, you know that you know the information

Question 19

Implicit Memory

Answer 19

• Memory that occurs without the learners awareness

Question 20

Declarative Memory

Answer 20

• A broad class of memories, both semantic and episodic that can be easily verbalized or communicated in some other way (what)

Question 21

Non-Declarative Memory

Answer 21

• skill memory
• not always consciously accessible
• not easy to verbalize

Question 22

cues for better recall

Answer 22

• free recall: generating requested information, no cues
• cued recall: involves promt or cue, aided recall
• recognition: recognizing item from set of options