Long-Term Memory Systems Flashcards
Week 3
1
Q
what are the two long term memory systems?
A
declarative memory
non-declarative memory
2
Q
what is declarative memory?
A
- Conscious recollection
- Episodic memories: thing that have happened in our lives
- Semantic memories: factual knowledge
- Explicit memory
- in the Medial temporal lobe & diencephalon
3
Q
what is non-declarative memory?
A
- Unconscious:
- procedural memories: how to do things
- Priming
- Implicit memory: may not be aware of, not consciously happening.
- in the Basal ganglia & Neocortex
4
Q
what is the breakdown of long-term memory systems?
A
long-term memory splits into declarative memory and non-delarative memory. declaratove memory forms episodic and semantic memories and non-declarative memory forms procedural memory and priming.
5
Q
what is episodic memory?
A
- Recollection of events
- Remember something as a second hand experience.
- Things that are part of your daily life.
Where and when personal events occurred - Memory that has been encountered multiple times but no longer linked to those experiences
- Has become general knowledge.
6
Q
what is semantic memory?
A
- Facts or general knowledge about the world
- Don’t really have to think about
- Don’t have to make a lot of effort to remember it.
- Abstracted from actual experience
- Stored in the form of concepts
- mental representations of categories (e.g. objects)
7
Q
is episodic memory like a video recorder?
A
- Are you reconstructing the experience based on what you think has happened
- Easy to miss things
- How accurate is our memory
- Reproduce a detailed and accurate picture of the past…
- Requires a large amount of processing
- What you recall is not of the same accuracy as a video
- We tend to recall important aspects: how we felt, who was there, what happened etc.
8
Q
how is episodic memory a construction of events?
A
- Rather than reproductive
- Access gist, with trivial details omitted
- Only remember important aspects
- Flexibility needed to form future plans
- Use knowledge acquired to know what to do next time
- Prone to error and illusions
- Easy to plant false memories
- Study that makes people believe they committed a crime in their youth- can easily make them believe they were there.
- Childhood memories- memory is repeated over and over to the point where we feel we remember it too even though we didn’t.
9
Q
how is semantic memory stored in concepts?
A
- mental representations of categories (e.g. objects)
- Concepts are organised in hierarchies
10
Q
what are the 3 concepts used in semantic memory?
A
- superordinate level: the larger concept the object belongs to.
- basic level: tend to describe a specific object
- subordinate level: describe the object in a more specific sense- specify the type.
11
Q
which concept is acquired by children first?
A
Basic level
12
Q
how is the role of expertise important for concepts?
A
- Birdwatchers: Subordinate categories when naming birds
- Dog experts: Subordinate categories when naming breads of dog
- Faces: Subordinate level used especially when identifying someone you know- use names and address them as individuals.
13
Q
what do mental concepts look like?
A
- Traditionally, assumed that to have the following characteristics: Abstract in nature/ Stable
- Argued that concepts can vary depending on your goals, experiences etc.
- Shared across individuals
- More recently, argued that concepts vary depending on…
- Individual’s goals
- Current context/setting
Barsalou (2009, 2012)
14
Q
what are goal-based categories?
A
- Difficult to define and are different for everyone.
e.g.: - Things to take in a fire
- Things you would do if you won the lottery
- Things that float
15
Q
what are schemas?
A
- A number of different objects/ chunks are integrated into one section of knowledge.
- Helps make sense of the world- without having to use a lot of cognitive resources.
- Draw conclusion about what is happening.
Pick out salient clues from the environment to explain the behaviour and situation. - Integrated chunks of knowledge about the world, events, people or actions. (Abstract form)
- Factual knowledge that you have gained from experience- now become a stand alone fact about a concept on its own.
- In the form of scripts
Information about the sequencing of events - Abstract and corresponding to individual words
- Broader, more flexible structures of information
16
Q
what is anterograde amnesia?
A
- Reduced ability to acquire new memories
- Don’t lose all memory
- May lose memories from a certain point onwards.
- Damage to hippocampus
○ Poor episodic memory
○ Don’t remember personal experiences well. - Damage to para-hippocampal cortex
○ Poor semantic memory
○ Not easily able to remember knew factual knowledge. - Damage to both regions
○ Poor episodic/semantic memory
○ Both factors are lacking - Tells us they are stored and processed in different parts of the brain
- Qualitatively different
- Can both be affected separately and together.
- If one is affected, doesn’t mean the other will be affected.
17
Q
what is interdependence?
A
- Involve similar brain systems at time encoding and retrieval
- A level of interdependence between them.
- During coding and retrieval- episodic and semantic memories.
18
Q
what did Kan et al (2009) study in relation to interdependence?
A
- Learn prices of grocery items (episodic memory task)
- Prices either congruent (what you would normally expect to pay in a shop) or incongruent (not what they would expect) with prior knowledge (semantic memory)
- Healthy controls had better memory for congruent grocery prices
- When prices were what they would normally expected to pay (episodic in line with semantic) could remember it more as it fit in with expectations
- Amnesiac patients with poor semantic memory showed no congruency effect
- Remembered both of the prices equally (well or badly)
- For healthy controls, showed how the systems support each other and work together.
19
Q
what is semanticism?
A
- Episodic memories can become semantic memories over time
- Know it as a fact but don’t know how you know it is true- becomes engraved.
- lack personal/contextual information over time
20
Q
what did Harland et al (2012) study in relation to semanticism?
A
- 200 pictures presented to participants
- Memory tested 3-days and 3-months later using ‘remember/know’ paradigm
- 100% sure they saw it vs pretty sure they saw the photo
- Some memories episodic (remembered) at both intervals, with stable hippocampal activations
- Others were episodic at short interval, but became semantic (know, or familiar) at long interval
- Became semantic after 3 months- felt familiar, some images became somaticized rather than episodic over a long time.
21
Q
what are the two forms of non-declarative memory?
A
- priming
- procedural
22
Q
what is priming?
A
- Facilitated processing of repeated stimuli
- Can shape thoughts and behaviour for subsequent things that happen to you
- Occurs very rapidly- Too fast to notice
- Tied to a specific stimulus
- Specific to a situation
- Short lived
23
Q
what is procedural memory?
A
- Skill learning (e.g. riding a bike)
- Happens slowly- initially for it to become automatic
○ Occurs very slowly
○ Generalises to numerous stimuli - Once it is automatic it can generalise across stimuli and behaviours
- Also referred to as ‘knowing how’ memory- For skills that have become automatic.
- Includes memory for acquired skills and abilities that have become automated and can be carried out without conscious thought
- Many of the processes stored in procedural memory are initially effortful before being fully learnt and no longer requiring concentrated attention to be completed
- Need to be learned initially to become automated
- Automatisation of these processes allows capacity to be freed up for more urgent tasks that require cognitive resources
24
Q
what are the two types of priming?
A
- Perceptual
* Repeated presentation of a stimulus leads to a facilitated processing of its perceptual features
* Something that is based on its appearance/ visual features of the way it looks
* superficial - Conceptual
* Repeated presentation of a stimulus leads to facilitated processing of its meaning
* What does it mean/refer to as an object
25
Q
what type of memory is also known as explicit memory?
A
declarative memory
26
Q
what type of memory is tied to a specific stimulus?
A
priming
27
Q
what type of memory uses recollection of past events?
A
episodic memory
28
Q
which type of memory focuses on unconscious awareness?
A
procedural memory
29
Q
how do we study memory?
A
- Key differences between everyday memory and lab- based memory
- Memory is often studied in lab-based settings as its so complex to study- does cause hiccups.
30
Q
what are the differences between everyday memory and lab-based memory?
A
- Everyday memory
* Long time and often remembered
* Incidental: don’t actively try to remember all the details
* Social factors important: the people we interact with are important, what the experience is like.
* Accuracy is not our main goal/motive: remember the information we want to - Lab-based memory
* Remember information shortly beforehand: no long-term memory there
* Intentional: remembering information for a specific purpose.
* Social factors and demands absent: social factors aren’t important as you just want to do well
* Motivated to be as accurate as possible: want to be perceived as being good and doing well, make an effort to remember as much as possible- little intentional conscious effort on unimportant stimuli.
31
Q
what is autobiographical memory?
A
- Long-term memory for life events
- Type of episodic memory.
- Related to episodic memory, as both relate to personally experienced events.
- Relevant to an individuals personal life.
- Complex memories of personal significance that extend back over many years
- Everything you have gone through since you have born
- Stands out as a major life event- meaningful, big or small events worth remembering.
32
Q
how are flashbulb memories an example of autobiographical memory?
A
- Vivid memories of distinctive events
- Something that happened- usually a shared experience with many people
- Long-lasting if there was an intense emotional experience when formed
- Can be positive or negative
- Has a massive emotional impact- often completely unexpected.
33
Q
how is trauma an example of an autobiographical memory?
A
- Painful memories repressed to protect person from psychological harm
- Some instances may be remembered others are repressed.
- Not consciously aware of anymore
34
Q
what is childhood amnesia?
example of autobiographical memory
A
- Inability to recall autobiographical memories from early childhood
- Neurogenesis= process of generating new neurons
- Cant clearly recall memories from early childhood.
- May think you remember something but you actually don’t.
- Due to lots of new connections in the brain developing
- Don’t have developed schemas or knowledge of the world- not much context to place memories in making them easier to forget.
35
Q
what is a reminiscence bump?
a form of autobiographical memory
A
- Recall disproportionate number of memories from early adulthood
- teenager adulthood
- Generation of life scripts
- Many significant life events happen
36
Q
what is the significance of Jill price?
A
- The woman who cant forget.
- Example of where memory went “wrong”
37
Q
what is retrospective memory?
A
- Emphasis is on the past
- Recalling things that have happened
- Many external cues
- Things that can remind us of an event.
- What we already know= high informational content
- Lot of information that we know about things that have already happened.
38
Q
what is prospective memory?
A
- Remembering to carry-out an intended action
- External reminders become part of the environment- would need creating by the individual to remember something
- Absence of an explicit reminder
- When to do something = low informational content
- Don’t know what the event iwll look like as it hasn’t happened yet.
39
Q
what are the stages of prospective memory?
A
- Intention formation
* Intention linked to a specific cue
* Deciding to do a particular thing - Retention interval
* Environmental monitoring of task-relevant cues
* Have to remember what you are going to do at that date and time
* Have to keep track of the environment to remember the action you want to complete. - Cue detection and intention retrieval
* Realise the relevant cue has happened. - Intention recall
* Retrieve intention from retrospective memory.
* Remember exactly what it was you needed to do.
* Recall the attention of the action to be completed. - Intention execution
* Fairly automatic and undemanding
* Execute the action to attend what you wanted to do
40
Q
what are the types of prospective memory?
A
- Time-based: Remembering to perform an intended action at the right time
- Event-based: Remembering to perform an intended action in the right place
- Implementation intention- Action plans to achieve goal, Where, when and how will goal be achieved
41
Q
which type of memory includes vivid memories of distinctive events?
A
flashbulb memory
42
Q
which type of memory focuses on remembering to perform an intended action?
A
prospective memory
43
Q
which type of memory uses long-term memory for personal life events?
A
autobiographical memory
