Neuropsychology of Memory

Question 1

Amnesia

Answer 1

memory loss

Question 2

Impact of Amnesia:

Answer 2

• intelligence is intact
• attention span intact
• personality intact

ability to take in new information is severely and usually permanently affected

Question 3

“H.M could remember things from his childhood but had incomplete memories for a few months before the operation”

Why?

Answer 3

• were not concretely
  encoded/”trodden”
• susceptible to loss when head
  injury, insult or in this case surgery

Question 4

H.M’s phonological store and visual sketchpad unaffected but

Answer 4

was unable to create new memories

Question 5

Amnesia is usually caused by damage to the

Answer 5

medial temporal lobe or anatomically connected regions

(hippocampus)

involved in the laying down of new episodic memories

Question 6

Anterograde Amnesia:

Answer 6

insert figure

Question 7

Anterograde Amnesia:

Answer 7

• after brain injury, new episodic
  memories can not be formed
• HM was severely impaired no
  matter regardless of the sensory
  modality through which info was
  presented and the format of the
  test

Question 8

Procedural Memory:

Answer 8

• learning of motor skills is distinct
  from explicit long term memory
• involved the basal ganglia
• when a skill becomes automatic, it
  can operate in the absence of
  awareness

Question 9

Amnesiacs can not learn new procedural skills.

True or False?

Answer 9

False

they can learn new skills

Question 10

Evidence for independent procedural memory system:

Answer 10

• task was a pursuit-rotor task
• healthy controlsand patients with
  Alzheimer’s showed normal
  learning (implicit memory)
• patients with huntington’s disease
  were impaired

Question 11

Anterograde Amnesia Flowchart:

Answer 11

insert flowchart

Question 12

Episodic Memory:

Answer 12

• memories for events and
  occurrences that are specific in
  time and place
• what where when

Question 13

Semantic Memory:

Answer 13

• knowledge of facts, concepts,
  word meanings etc
• can be retrieved without
  knowledge about where and when
  the information was acquired

Question 14

Declarative Memory Theory:

Answer 14

• all declarative memories (episodic
  and semantic) depend on medial
  temporal lobes for their
  acquisition and short-term
  retention

Question 15

In anterograde amnesia, what type of memories are typically affected?

Answer 15

• episodic memory is poor and
  generally grossly impaired
• semantic memory poor but might
  be able to form new memories

Question 16

Can new semantic memories be formed despite amnesia?

Answer 16

Yes
hence semantic memories involved the hippocampus but also other regions of the brain

generally through incidental learning/ comparing different pictures

not supporting squire’s declarative memory theory

Question 17

Retrograde Amnesia:

Answer 17

• loss of memories before the brain
  injury
• some degree of retrograde
  amnesia is almost always present
• the extent of retrograde amnesia
  for episodic memories is highly
  contested

Question 18

What is declarative memory theory?

Answer 18

all declarative memories (episodic and semantic) depend on medial temporal lobes for their acquisition and short term

over time, declarative memories become consolidated to other brain regions

Question 19

Standard Model of Consolidation:

Answer 19

insert diagram

Question 20

Retrograde Amnesia: Types of Memory Affected:

Answer 20

• semantic memory learned long
  ago is intact
• evidence is preserved remote
  episodic memory is mixed
• episodic memory is mixed likely

Question 21

Semantic Dementia:

Answer 21

• poor knowledge of meaning of
  words or concepts
• naming difficulties
• not confined to one modality;
  deficits may include a difficulty in
  recognising sounds

semantic knowledge is associated with lateral temporal cortex

knows what she has done but can not find the words to express herself

Question 22

Confabulation:

Answer 22

• people with frontal lobe damage
• often know the knowledge
• people make up where they
  learned the knowledge
• family often get very angry as they
  believe they are lying
• caused by a breakdown in
  memory control processes such as
  monitoring whether retrieved
  memories are relevant to now
• not actual memory loss