Memory Flashcards
3 Stages of Memory
Sensory
Short Term
Long Term
Sensory Memory
Involves transforming sensory input into data that can be understood & stored as a visual or auditory image (must transfer to short term memory to do so)
Iconic Memory lasts ___
1/2 second
Echoic Memory lasts ____
up to 4 seconds
Selective Attention
Only sensory input that is attended to can pass into short term memory, can be deliberate or automatic
Short Term Memory
Processes ongoing info to store memories for short duration (up to 30 sec)
2 components of Short Term Memory
Primary Memory
Working Memory
Primary Memory
Passive “holding tank” for info requiring no manipulation
i.e. digits in sequence
Working Memory
Holds & manipulates info
How is short term memory enhanced or transferred to long term memory?
Rehearsal, or deliberate repetition
Capacity of Short Term Memory
Seven items, plus or minus 2
Chunking
Involves transforming separate items into meaningful units that are more easily recalled
Dual Coding System for STM
Verbal & Visual Channels
Some theorists divide Long Term Memory into _____ and ____
Recent Memory (2 wks) Remote (2 yrs or more)
Some research supports importance of ___ ___ for long term memory
REM sleep, where LTM is reviewed, improved, systematically catalogued
Concepts assoc w/LTM
Retrieval Priming Zeigarnik Effect Redintigration Landmark Events Flashbult Memories Prospective Memory Effects of Hypnosis
Retrieval
Accessing info from LTM into STM for analysis & awareness
Often a cue stimulates the retrieval process
Recognition easier than recall b/c recog acts like a table of contents
Priming
Exposure to a stimulus, which makes it easier for person to recog the stim at a later time
Zeigarnik Effect
When you come to an impasse with a task involving recall, brain continues to work unconsciously until the solution is obtained.
Redintigration
When something rapidly unlocks a chain of memories, like a smell from childhood
Landmark Events
Helps w/retrieval by anchoring to important events in life. We can use those events to locate other events occurring around the same time
ex: using wedding to remember when we got hank
Flashbulb Memories
Vivid memories of events, typically traumatic. can remember what happened before & after in addition to the event itself
Prospective Memory
Remembering that you planned to do something at a particular time
Effects of Hypnosis
Tends to elicit more false memories than real ones, more likely to use imagination to fill in gaps in memories, then feel very confident of accuracy; also vulnerable to leading questions by the hypnotizer
Accuracy of LTM
Process of transfer to LTM & retrieval often distorts original info
Likely b/c LTM relies on semantic meaning, which is subjective
Also make inferences about info and these (which may not be accurate) and these are stored in LTM
Sleeper Effect
Source of Info forgotten over time, while message itself is retained
Areas where accuracy of LTM significantly questioned
Eyewitness reports
Repressed memories
Popular classification schema for memory
Declarative/explicit
Procedural/implicit
Declarative Memory (Explicit)
Conscious recollection of info or experiences
Divisions of Declarative Memory
Semantic-meaning of words, facts, abstract info or images
Episodic-autobiographical events, retrieval requires reconstructing the event in your mind
Procedural Memory (Implicit)
Recollection of skills, physical operations, procedures that are automatic & without conscious awareness
William Scoville
Discovered critical role of hippocampus in long term memory through removal of pt’s temporal lobes to treat seizures, resulting in anterograde amnesia
Brain areas involved in memory
Frontal Lobes (esp STM) Temporal cortex Hippocampus Thalamus Mamillary bodies Basal Forebrain
Neurotransmitter implicated in memory
*Need this to ACE the test
Acetylcholine (probs w/prod of ACh in Alzheimers
Long term potentiation
Repeated stim of a synapse thru rehearsal leaves to chem & structural changes to the receiving neuron, increases sensitivity of neuron to stimulation
kinases
Enzymes involved in LTP (long term potentiation), changes dendrites
Research on forgetting
Ebbinghaus
Discovered forget most fully memorized nonsense info within first hour (only applies to info that is meaningless to us)
Serial Position Effect
Immediate recall- Remember words at beginning & end of list better than those in middle
Delayed recall- remember words at beginning best
Types of Amnesia
Anterograde-impaired ability to create new memories
Retrograde-Loss of memories before injury or disease
Posttraumatic-loss of memory for short time after a trauma
Paramnesia-Distortion of memory, confabulation
Factors involved in forgetting
Retrieval Failure
Interference (Retroactive or Proactive)-other learned material interferes
Decay-difficult to separate from interference
Mood Congruent Memory
State Dependent Memory
Motivated Forgetting-proposed by Freud-unconscious blocking of painful memory
Strategies to Enhance Memory
Chunking Imagery & Association Recreation of context Study strategies (distributed practice, rehearsal at reg spaced intervals) Mnemonics
types of Mnemonics
Method of Loci-placing items to be remembered in different spots in an imaginary room
Peg Word system-Memorize set of 10 visual images that are pegs on which to hang ideas
Word Associations
Substitute Word Technique
Amnesia vs Inhibition
Amnesia-inability to recall
Inhibition- interference w/learning
Interference theory of memory
proposes that we remember best when we minimize interference immediately after we learn something
For example- go to sleep directly after studying
