Memory Flashcards
What are the stages of memory?
-Sensation
-Perception (encoding into working memory)
-Working memory/Short-Term memory (desk)
-Long-Term memory (filing cabinet)
Two subtypes of long-term memory and define
-Procedural memory: how to do things. Can further be divided into skills and classical conditioning
-Declarative memories: includes semantic memory (facts) and episodic memory (things that happen in our lives, personal to us)
Encoding and what affects encoding
The process by which our perceptions of the stimuli from the environment are moved into our memory system so that we can process and store it further
-Nature of the encoding process determines what we can remember. Memory is influenced by quantity and quality
-Attention impacts the ability we encode information. More attention we pay, more deeply we process the information.
Craig and Tulving
3 conditions
1. words are capitalized (does not require attention)
2. word rhymes with a focal word (a little deeper processing
3. whether or not word could fit in a sentence given (semantic coding; deep processing)
Found people remembered things better in third condition opposed to second condition.
-Reflects the way that our processing strategy influences our memory
Valentine and Bruce
asked participants to respond whether or not recognized faces as familiar or unfamiliar.
-unfamiliar: did not really matter if faces were typical or distinctive
-familiar: people are much faster at recognizing distinctive than a typical face
may be because we spend more time paying attention to what distinctive faces are.
Distinctiveness can influence attention
Processing Strategies
-Associations
-Organization
-Rehearsal
Associations
Allows more pathways for retrieval
-Elaboration: thinking more deeply; self-referencing, visual imagery
-Organization: chunking, mnemonics (linking to well-known route).
-Rehearsal: repeating info, massed and distributed learning, testing
-massed/distributed learning: study over time
-Testing: example questions
What affects encoding (summed)
-Availability of the information
-Quality or quantity
-Attention
-Method of processing
Retrieval
Processes involved in accessing our memory
-memory is a reconstruction, it always changes every time a memory is retrieved depending on mood and our environment
In relation to forensics, why is the pattern of activation important?
Witnesses are often asked to recount what happened to them at a variety of different points in time. Every time they try to remember, what they say is often slightly different.
Levelling
We do not have cognitive capacity to take large amounts of information in at one time, story is made shorter
Sharpening
Certain details were retained very sharply
Shifting
Certain details are aligned and shifted to align with existing schemas
Schemas
Mental frameworks for the nature of events and situations we use to help us function successfully in a variety of situations.
-script.
-Can help us to remember incorrect information
Familiarity
Poor quality has little impact on recognition if there is already familiarity with someone, but if not, less likely to recognize them