Memory Flashcards
‘knowing that’ is what kind of memory ?
declarative memory
‘knowing how’ is what kind of memory?
procedural memory
What are the three basic memory processes ?
1) encoding, acquisition
2)storage
3) retrieval and reconstruction
what kind of information is highly prone to forgetting and why?
unstructured information, particularly episodic information.
The goal of learning is not just to hold onto specific episodes, it’s to store knowledge
What is the benefit of providing context in order to organise and hold information?
Providing a context – even a novel, unexpected, idiosyncratic context –helps organize and hold onto information
In Bransford and Johnson (1972) context experiment, which group had better recall of the main ideas from the story?
the group who were given a picture with the story passage
what do semantic memory models assume?
all models assume that information is organized in a network
what types of structures are there in semantic memory?
-chunks in working memory
-schemas (larger structures acquired through
experience, stored in LTM)
what is the initial capacity estimate for short term memory?
7 +or- 2
if there is a chain of 16 memories and memory capacity is 7+/- 2, how can you remember all 16 digits?
recoding them as 4 dates
what is a chunk?
a chunk is a meaningful group of information. chunking is a means of functionally increasing working memory capacity
what does chunking rely on?
accumulated knowledge
what is the working memory capacity for chunks?
estimated at 4
What is a schema?
Schemas are clusters/configurations/frameworks (“chunks”) of knowledge for objects, places, events, actions, etc.
Schemas are abstract: they hold information about a type of object, place, event, or action rather than about a specific one
what are schemas for sequences of actions called?
scripts
what are schemas good for?
schemas can influence encoding, storage, and retrieval.
Schemas create expectations, reduce processing load. We don’t have to encode and remember every detail
what do schemas consist of ?
Frames: central things that are expected and encoded quickly (ie. a house has a roof, door, walls)
Slots: can be filled with different types of information (for example doors size, windows, colours)
how do schemas allow us to deal with missing information?
by making inferences. e.g. if no specific info is given, we’ll assume that a house has a pointy roof by default
what kind of objects do we have better memory for?
Better memory for schema-consistent objects (desk, shelves) than inconsistent objects (skull, wine bottle).
Also false recall of schema-consistent but absent objects.
Why might some studies show better recall of schema-inconsistent information?
Consistency Effect-
This information may be encoded with priority: it is unexpected and thus cannot
be reconstructed later by activating a schema
What were the results of the home buyer/burglar experiment where Participants are told to read a story either from the perspective of a homebuyer or the perspective of a burglar?
First Recall (from one perspective): Participants recalled more items consistent with the queried schema than items consistent with the other schema
Second Recall (after shifting to the other perspective): Participants now also recalled more items consistent with the new queried schema than during the first recall, as well as fewer items consistent with the other schema
How do schemas facilitate retrieval?
by functioning as retrieval cues
Definition of Expertise in Cognitive psychology:
domain-specific mastery, consistent superior performance in a domain
* high levels of knowledge of concepts, facts, procedures
* better organization of this knowledge
How did SF increase his working memory digit span to 80?
after 200-300 hours of practice he encoded new information by connecting it to what he already knew, building on existing knowledge. (expertise). Combining smaller chunks into more complex chunks
How does a chess player’s expertise aid their memory?
expert chess players could recall chess positions presented very briefly (5 sec) better than novices
Are there cases of exceptional memory?
No: exceptional memory = acquired skill (Ericsson et al., 2004)
What are the principles of developing expert performance?
- Encoding principle: rely on prior knowledge (LTM) to create chunks
- Retrieval structure principle: use retrieval cues as “pointers” to information in LTM
- Speed-up principle: speed up with practice
How can a person become an expert?
The “10 year rule” (Simon & Chase, 1973)
Years of deliberate practice.
* motivation and focus on improvement (optimizing performance)
* development of strategies (repetition alone is not enough)
* repeated engagement with the task with maximal effort
what explained performance differences in violinists?
Comparing time spent practicing in 4 groups of violinists:
performance differences can be boiled down to the amount of deliberate practice accumulated over time (but there is also an advantage to starting early)
How is declarative memory ‘captured’ by the brain?
The inability to form new memories is caused by damage to the hippocampus and other medial temporal lobe (MTL) structures (“extended hippocampal system”)
What did HM suffer from?
Anterograde amnesia (and retrograde amnesia) resulting from surgical MTL removal to alleviate seizures in 1953. He was unable to form new declarative memories.
What memory did Patient HM keep intact?
-Short Term Memory and Working Memory
-New Procedural memories (i.e. motor learning)
What happened to Clive Wearing after he suffered multiple subcortical structures caused by encephalitis?
Severe anterograde amnesia
What is Anterograde Amnesia vs Retrograde Amnesia?
Anterograde: forgetting events or conversations that just happened/inability to form new memories after a traumatic event
Retrograde: forgetting events that happened before the onset of amnesia/loss of memories before the event
What cases are evidence for a dissociation between declarative and procedural memory?
Patient HM (Henry Molaison), Patient CW (Clive Wearing)
What is the Medial Temporal Lobe, such as the hippocampus, critical for?
The acquisition of declarative memories
What is the function of the Hippocampus?
-binds information together quickly to create higher-level representations
-Not a long term storage site. damage does not harm already formed memories
What happens to representations after passing through the Hippocampus?
Representations are then stored/distributed across networks in other cortical areas,
becoming integrated with old information
What is the limit of information in the neocortex?
there isn’t a limit, you can always keep learning
What is ‘catastrophic interference’ according to the ‘Complementary Learning Systems Model’?
new information can interfere and replace old information
How do memories become less vulnerable to interference?
-By having two stages for learning
-Slow long term storage in neocortex
-Involving integration with existing knowledge in order to reduce interference
Describe knowledge from a cognitive neuroscience perspective:
knowledge is structured/organised information
Two stages to learning:
Hippocampus->Neocortex
According to O’Reilly and Norman (2002), what are the two incompatible goals for learning?
-remember specifics
-extract generalities
What is consolidation?
a slow neocortical learning process that “stabilises” or “fixes” memories in LTM
across hours/days, from the hippocampus to the neocortex
What is Systemic consolidation?
Consolidation can be described as a gradual shift of a memory’s reliance away from the
hippocampus and to the cortex (accomplished by repeatedly “replaying” a memory’s various
components until they are interlinked; may take years to complete).
What is a temporal gradient in retrograde amnesia?
recently formed memories are recalled more poorly than remote memories, presumably because they didn’t undergo consolidation
When do consolidation processes begin?
transfer to neocortex begins during “offline” hours (i.e., during sleep), when you process minimal external input
How was memory recall of nonsense syllables in people who were tested after a full nights sleep and what did this conclude?
-twice as many syllables reported after sleep compared to being awake condition
-Conclusion: sleep may “protect” memories from interference
‘Passive Protection’ Hypothesis:
sleep protects against interference
‘Permissive Consolidation’ Hypothesis:
sleep reduces interference, which creates the necessary conditions for consolidation
‘Active Consolidation’ Hypothesis:
sleep is directly involved in consolidation
How does sleep aid memory?
*early sleep – primarily slow-wave sleep (SWS), important for the consolidation of hippocampus-dependent declarative learning (as well as for procedural learning)
- late sleep – primarily REM sleep, important for procedural learning, no immediate benefit for declarative memories (except for emotional declarative memories)
In an experiment of procedural learning comparing performance after x hours of being asleep or awake, what did sleep deprivation reduce improvement by?
75%
In a test based on learning of new words, when did declarative memory improve?
After sleep, better declarative memory
How can you “simulate” amnesia by interfering with the consolidation process?
Midazolam: (injection used to produce drowsiness and reduce anxiety before a surgery) impaired recognition of pictures of common objects when tested 24 hours later (Nyhus & Curran, 2012)
- Alcohol: impaired recall of a mock crime compared to sober controls (Van Oorsouw & Merckelbach, 2012)
What is the savings method by Ebbinghaus (nonsense syllables)?
the reduction in number of trials necessary to re-learn the material over different
retention intervals
According to Ebbinghaus, what is ‘forgetting’ consistent with’?
power function: forgetting generally fastest shortly after learning, then a slower decline
What did Bahrick (1984) find when testing the retention of Spanish vocabulary up to 50 years after school instruction?
-rapid loss in the first 3 years, then relatively stable until 35 years
– further decline between 35 and 50 years
-permastore
What is ‘Permastore’?
after the initial decline, memories appear to be very resistant to loss
What was the relationship between the degree of initial learning and forgetting over time? (when participants answered questions about publicized events)
-rapid loss at short intervals, then slower loss
-forgetting rates do not depend on degree of learning (rate of forgetting doe snot change with rate of exposure)
If you compare information that you have learned (retained) better to poorer learned information, what is different about the forgetting function?
The function looks different with better learning because because better learning initially results in a pattern of more linear forgetting, than Ebbinghaus-consistent forgetting
What is the nature of remembering high level knowledge?
better memory for high level knowledge overall, with a different forgetting pattern
What is stability bias?
We believe that memories are “stable”:
1. we generally overestimate our ability to remember (and we underestimate the influence of time on forgetting)
2. we also generally underestimate the effects of repetition and practice on learning
When we forget something, is the information lost?
1) Storage: information may be, in fact, “lost” – e.g., because the memory trace itself is poor or deteriorating (a problem with storage, “passive” forgetting)
2) Retrieval: information may be inaccessible – e.g., because of a lack of retrieval cues or because of interference (a problem with retrieval, “passive” forgetting
3) information may be inhibited (“active” forgetting, supressing information)
Why do we forget?
Some amount of forgetting is adaptive-
“If we remembered everything, we should on most occasions be as ill off as if we remembered nothing (James, 1890)”
We prioritise information on what is helpful
What is the argument between Decay and Interference?
DECAY: does information simply “fade” with time and disuse ?
INTERFERENCE: is old information “lost” due to acquisition of new information
What are the two types of interference?
-Proactive
-Retroactive
What is Proactive interference?
previously learned information can interfere with acquisition of new information e.g., you move to a new city (new post code), but your old post code keeps coming to mind
What is Retroactive interference?
new information can interfere with retrieval of previously learned information e.g., after some time, you can’t remember your old post code anymore
What is cue dependence forgetting?
Information may be inaccessible due to a lack of retrieval cues → providing cues should improve memory performance.
“When we forget something we once knew, it does not necessarily mean that the memory trace has been lost; it may only be inaccessible” (Tulving, 1974)
What does non-cued recall show?
retroactive interference
Are cues externally or internally sourced?
Both
Describe the divers study of retrieval (1975):
-divers studied word lists either on land or under water
– retention was 50% higher when context remained constant
what is mood dependent/state dependent memory?
recall is enhanced if the learner’s mood state at encoding and retrieval is the same i.e. emotional state, alcohol consumption
What is meant by ‘forgetting by remembering’?
strengthening some information at the expense of other information
What can strengthen a memory trace?
repeated retrieval
Retrieval Induced Forgetting:
to allow successful retrieval, we use inhibition to resolve competition or interference arising during retrieval
When is Retrieval Induced Forgetting (RIF) observed?
when studied items compete. Inhibition of RIF is short lived.
How are details remembered in eyewitness testimony?
*high motivation to remember
* high likelihood of telling the same story again and again
The paradox of expertise:
experts have more knowledge, which can lead to poorer recall of information compared to novices
How does Integration reduce Retrieval Induced Forgetting?
Integrated bits of information are less likely to interfere and compete with one another.
In complex structures or networks, concepts are connected by associative links: the network functions as a “unit”.
The presence of links between concepts produces activation rather than competition
Can you supress memories?
Yes- Freudian repression. Evidence suggests it is possible for people to have active control of their memory.
What is an amnesic shadow?
when some individuals cannot remember details of a traumatic event that just happened
What happens to brain activity during memory suppression?
hippocampal deactivation
What are the advantages of labels activating schemas?
We do not need to store exact copies of the information we process.
→ Schemas facilitate encoding, simplify storage, and guide retrieval.
In other words, schemas guide/shape online processing and memory representations
what are disadvantages of labels activating schemas?
Schemas do not preserve episodic details.
Thus when recalling information – particularly at a delay – we might generate or construct a reasonable, but potentially distorted, memory
What is a semantic intrusion?
memory distortions, false memories
what is our degree of reconstruction?
We remember the gist; we forget the details
* remember the verbal label, forget the perceptual form
* remember the meaning, forget verbatim information
What effects did the DRM word recall paradigm show?
-showed the serial positions effect (remembering words said at the start or end better)
-55% recall of critical (not studied) items.. false memory/logical errors
What did Roediger and McDermott (1995) say about remembering?
All remembering is constructive in nature. We “fill in the gaps” with information from LTM
What is the fuzzy tract theory?
Learners store a gist trace and a verbatim trace.
Verbatim traces are weaker than gist traces.
Learners generate false memories if they rely on gist traces.
what is the activation/monitoring framework?
false memories are generated by:
* activating related information in LTM
* and then failing to reject this information as not having been studied
Describe memory activation:
Activated information activates related information, either consciously or unconsciously, Spreading activation in
semantic networks
Contributing Factors to activation:
More associations: Strength of associations, Number of semantic associates, Focusing on semantic relationships
Poor monitoring → difficulty rejecting intrusions → more false memories
What is reality monitoring?
ability to discriminate between internally-generated and externally-generated memories
What were the results of Payne et al DRM task where they listened to Jason or Carol read a list of words and were asked to identify the sources of each word?
if asked explicitly, participants are unable to correctly identify the source of words in DRM lists
What is source monitoring?
Source Monitoring: ability to recall or judge the origin or source of a memory, If we don’t remember the original source, we may misattribute a memory to the wrong source
→ source misattribution.
How can source monitoring be strengthened?
-distinctiveness
-warnings
-processing time at test
Describe a Misinformation Paradigm:
Picture slides (30 min interval)->introduction of misinformation (10 min interval) -> Recognition test and sources-monitoring test
Describe the paradigm (Loftus and Pickrell 1995) where participants ‘recovered’ memories they didn’t have:
*Collect childhood experiences from the parents of young adults.
* Interview the adults repeatedly about memory for these events plus one that had never happened.
* At first, people do not “remember” the new event. But in subsequent interviews, some do report it as a real memory
What happens when there is no schema for a memory?
Reconstruction of stories:
-recall content errors (evidence of distortion and reconstructions) but schema consistent information remains intact
Does the process of recalling information leave the memory trace for that information intact?
the process of recalling information does not leave the memory trace for that information intact
