Neuropsychology of Memory

Question 1

What is affected in amnesia?

Answer 1

Ability to take in new information is severely (and usually permanently) disabled

Question 2

What may not be affected by amnesia?

Answer 2

Intelligence
Attentional span
Personality

May all remain unaffected

Question 3

What were the initials of the American man who hit his had and suffered intractable epilepsy, followed by surgery which left him with anterograde amnesia?

Answer 3

HM

Question 4

Which lobes were removed from HM?

Answer 4

Hippocampus & medial temporal lobes

Question 5

What conclusions were drawn about memory and the brain from HM?

Answer 5

That the hippocampus & temporal lobes are responsible for episodic memory

BUT

do not affect the phonological store and visual-spatial sketchpad in short term memory

Question 6

Damage to which lobe usually causes amnesia?

Answer 6

Damage to the medial temporal lobe

Question 7

Where is the hippocampus located?

Answer 7

Deep in the medial temporal lobes.

Question 8

What is amnesia relating to loss of memory of time after a brain injury called?

Answer 8

Anterograde amnesia

Question 9

What is amnesia relating to loss of memory of a time period before a brain injury called?

Answer 9

Retrograde amnesia

Question 10

Memories closet to a brain injury are more vulnerable to loss than those which occurred further away. What is this called?

Answer 10

The temporal gradient

Question 11

What is procedural memory?

Answer 11

Memory of how to perform actions - is innate memory (e.g. how to ride a bike)

Question 12

Which part of the brain is responsible for innate memory?

Answer 12

Basal ganglia (& cerebellum)

Question 13

Which illness can affect the basal ganglia and therefore procedural memories?

Answer 13

Huntington’s disease

Question 14

What types of memory are the following?

• Knowing how to ride a bike
• Knowing what a bike is
• Knowing what age you learn to ride a bike

Answer 14

• Procedural
• Semantic
• Episodic

Question 15

What did HM’s experiments prove about procedural memory?

Answer 15

That amnesiacs with damage to temporal lobes could still learn new procedural skills (mirror experiments)

Therefore - procedural memory is INDEPENDENT to Declarative (episodic & semantic memory)

Question 16

How does Huntington’s disease evidence separate independent procedural memory?

Answer 16

Ps with Huntington’s had impaired procedural memory - whereas other Ps without Huntington’s but things like Alzheimers were unaffected.

Conclusion = procedural memory is separate via basal ganglia

Question 17

What are the two divisions of long term memory?

Answer 17

Declarative (Conscious)

Implicit (Not conscious)

Question 18

What are the two types of declarative memory?

Answer 18

Episodic (personal memories - what, where, when(

Semantic (facts & knowledge - no knowledge about where the information was acquired)

Question 19

What are the two types of implicit memory?

Answer 19

Priming

Procedural

Question 20

What did scientists (Warrington) prove about priming in amnesia tasks?

Answer 20

That Ps with amnesia could still learning how to prime (eg. degrading pictures)

Question 21

What did Squire (wrongly) postulate about declarative memories?

Answer 21

That episodic and semantic memories depend on the medial temporal lobes for acquisition and short-term retention.

He therefore postulated that if episodic memory was poor (due to amnesia) that semantic memory would always be poor as well

Question 22

How was Squire proved wrong?

Answer 22

Some amnesiacs could learn new semantic (word) memories (via implicit learning) even though their episodic memory was impaired.

Therefore they could learn unconsciously new semantic words, but not explicitly.

Question 23

What do we now conclude about anterograde amnesia?

Answer 23

That episodic memory is always impaired BUT there is evidence that there can be some new semantic learning in some situations.

Question 24

All declarative memories depend on which part of the brain for their acquisition and short-term storage?

What happens to these memories over time?

Answer 24

Medial temporal lobes

Over time = become consolidated to other brain regions - e.g. cerebral cortex

Question 25

How is declarative memory affected in retrograde amnesia?

Answer 25

Episodic memory can be impaired but semantic knowledge learned a long time ago remains okay

Question 26

What is semantic dementia?

Answer 26

Dementia which affects the semantic memory stores of the brain - means Ps have poor knowledge of word meaning / concepts, get words muddled and can include forgetting what sounds / sights mean

Question 27

Which part of the brain is semantic knowledge associated with?

Answer 27

The lateral temporal cortex (LHS of brain)

Question 28

What role does the frontal lobe play in memory?

Answer 28

Is responsible for attentional control - so affects what Ps pay attention to, and is also utilised in recalling specific information from memories in the brain. Is a control process of memory.

Question 29

What does a frontal lobe impairment present as clinically?

Answer 29

Confabulation

Question 30

What is confabulation?

Answer 30

Erroneous memories which are presented as the truth - seems like the P is lying / making things up, when they genuinely believe they are recalling the truth