Memory Process - Chapter 6 Content Flashcards
Define the levels of processing theory of memory.
This is how memory is thoughts to depend not on how long material is stored/what kind of storage, but more so on the initial encoding of the information to be remembered.
What is incidental learning?
It is when you learn things by accident or have no reason to learn that info.
Schemata
A framework is a large unit for organizing information such as concepts, situations and actions in memory. People create their won schemata based on their own life experiences.
What is your autobiographical memory?
These are the memories that happen in everyday life and have occurred in our personal past. Brewer did an experiment to show that most people where able to recall random memories from the past from his study with the college students with beepers.
What is flashbulb memory?
A vivid, enduring memory associated with a personally significant emotional event. Amygdala plays a huge part in these memories as it associated the emotions with the memory.
What is eyewitness memory?
This is a person’s episodic (event) memory for a crime or other witness dramatic event. This is commonly used in the justice system like a court. This si saying how memory can integrate suggested details and that misleading questions can affect how one recalls an event. (Whether you remembered that the car window was smashed if you say the cars hit vs smashed each other)
Explain the recovered vs. false memories debate.
recovered memories are retrieving memories that might have been repressed from traumatic experiences such as abuse, and then false ones are when you are told or think something so much that you just believe it and create a memory for it.
Define amnesia.
This is when people suffer from a memory disorder. Damage to the hippocampal system that is usually caused from a head injury, stroke, and brain tumor.
What are the different types of amnesia?
Anterograde: a deficit extending forward in time from the initial point of memory loss, always has retrograde too, doesn’t affect working memory, still has semantic and skill memory
Retrograde: loss of memory for info acquired and stored before the onset of amnesia, doesn’t affect overlearned skills (speaking) and are able to learn new skills but now remember why or how they learned it (guy who got zapped from sharing hands then didn’t wanna shake hands next time)
What are the 5 key principles of anterograde amnesia?
- Affects LTM but not working memory
- affects memory regardless of modality (what kind of info it is)
- spares memory for general knowledge
- spares skilled performance
- show hyperspecific memory (seem to be a version of the encoding specificity principle)
What are the 4 features of retrograde amnesia?
- temporal extent (the time span for which the memory is lost)
- it is episode one that is compromised
- spares info that was “overlearned”
- not to affect skill learning
Define memory consolidation.
The process by which a temporary, labile memory is transformed into a more stable, long-lasting form.
Explain the hierarchical semantic network model.
Explaining how we see memory as a library, as it consists of more than one storage area with distinct information. As there are more books, there need to also be more organized. This is a collection of nodes associated with all words and concepts for a person. there are 3 levels Subordinate then basic then superordinate and the deeper the info needed is in the model, the longer it will take to detect and retrieve.
Define cognitive economy.
That properties and facts are stored at the highest level possible, trying not to learn redundant information.
Explain the lexical decision tasks.
Asked participants to see a series of letters and asked if the letters form a word. When they had two strings, they were faster to respond if the other string was a semantically associated word rather than an unrelated word. This created the spreading activation, the idea that the excitation spreads along the connections of nodes in the network.
