PSYC1002 Flashcards
Help
What was behaviourism and who were the two major players?
• Behaviourism (1914) rejected internal mental structures, describing all behaviours as complex stimulus-response associations (Watson and Skinner)-it is a learning psychology focuses on learning behaviour, stimuli and processes. No point studying internal processes: consciousness-forbidden
.• Skinner thought freedom was bad-should have more reward/punishment system
• Thought learning was not able to occur without a rewards/punishment system. Humans had no internal drive to learn.
Why did behaviourism have to be abandoned
• Language- Skinner attempted to explain language in “verbal behaviour” – but proposal was not parsimonious. We likely have pre-existing structures to help us form language-language acquisition device of small children who learn language without punishment/reward
• Attention overload/limit- realised that couldn’t process everything at the same time all the time-important for the birth of cognitive psychology as behaviourism couldn’t explain this
-Tolman’s experiment
What is the difference between AI and cognitive psychology?
• Artificial intelligence- how humans could improve, cognitive psychology- what humans can do. Brought on by impractical serial exhaustive search from memory scanning example
What did Tolman argue in 1948?
- Disagreed with behaviourism- end of behaviourism
- Proposed that rats formed maps of the maze they were in, even without reward- said that rats had consciousness and that it wasn’t just simply a stimulus response reaction
Who’s data did Tolman use and what did this data describe?
• Experiment using Blodgett’s data
o Group I: control-run in maze once per day and found food in the goal box. Group I data resulted in shape of learning curve.
o Group II: experimental- not fed at all while in the maze for 7 days, then rewarded in maze from then on. Results didn’t show a learning curve and showed an extreme error curve drop once they did know where to find the food- suggested that rats had learned to build maps of the environment, and henceforth knew exactly where to go for the food- disproved behaviourism
o Group III: experimental- not fed at all while in the maze for 3 days, then rewarded in maze from then on
What was the impact of technology post WWII?
• Attentional overload:
o Discovering human limitations in mental processing
o The need for better training
o The need for better design
Ergonomics- an object’s efficiency in its purpose and comfort
• Computers take in and manipulate information
o Investigate mental processes scientifically
o Can use computers as a model for human information processing systems
o We can construct a model of cognitive processes and test the model by measuring human behaviour
What is the main cognitive model involving sensory memory, working short-term memory and long term memory?
- Sensory input is absorbed by the sensory memory: unattended information is quickly lost
- When paid attention to, information will transfer from the sensory memory to the short term memory: where unrehearsed information is quickly lost
- When properly encoded, this information goes into the long-term memory –> where some information may be lost over time
Who proposed mental chronometry?
Snodgrass
What is mental chronometry?
- Mental chronometry is the measurement of mental processes by the use of reaction time (the time thoughts take)
- Compare behaviour in two tasks that differ in only one mental process
- Choice RT – Simple RT=Estimate of stimulus evaluation time
- Can be used to infer the nature of the process
Describe Donder’s substraction method:
- Who and what it was influenced by
- How it worked
• Influenced by Helmholtz attempt to measure the speed of nerve transmission in the frog by measuring the time between the stimulation of a part of the frog’s body and the resulting muscular contraction. Since knew the approximate length of nerve fibres used the difference in reaction time as a measure of nerve transmission time.
• Donders reasoned that:
o A reaction: simple reaction time
o B reaction: choice reaction time
o C reaction: choice reaction time but with a response to only one response omitting all others (go/no-go response), theoretically discounting motor-choice time
o C-A= discrimination time
o B-C= motor-choice time
Why was Donder’s substraction method discounted?
o C had a motor choice time: the choice whether or not to have a response (Wundt)
Wundt proposed d reaction (several stimuli but only one response is made to all the stimuli-subject instructed to recognise/identify stimulus before responding)
o Experimenters were the test subjects themselves
Destroyed the assumption that stimulus input and motor-response time are equal.
What is simple reaction time?
the time elapsing between stimulus presentation and completion of the motor response
What is choice reaction time? And what does it include?
• Choice reaction time- two or more stimuli are presented, and the subject has to indicate which stimulus has been presented by producing one of two (or more responses), a different response for each stimulus. Includes:
o Discrimination time- the time to discriminate one stimulus from another
o Motor choice time- time to select one of the several motor responses
What is sternberg’s additive factors method and what does it involve?
- Involves manipulating the variables so that differences in RT between different levels of the same independent variable are used as measures of the duration of substages of the major stages.
- Involves binary reaction time paradigm- the subject chooses one of two responses in response to the presentation of a stimulus.
What does binary classification experiment mean?
more stimuli than responses: subject separates set of stimuli into two categories by responding to one set with one response and to the second set with the second response
How did Sternberg’s memory scanning experiment work?
• Subjects given short list of items to memorise
• Memory set size- length of the memory list
• Varied set procedure- memory set is either varied from trial to trial
• Fixed set procedure- remains constant across a blocked series of trials
• After the memory set has been presented to the subject, a trial begins with the presentation of the test item (probe): selected from the positive set or the negative set.
o Due to simplistic nature of task and a set size considerate of short term memory, few errors occur in this task and the major variable of interest is response time
What are the three different types of searches?
o Parallel self-terminating search- all objects considered at the same time
Predicts that negative responses will increase with set size, but at a negatively accelerated rate.
o Serial self-terminating search- search ends when object is found
On average, subjects need to search through (n+1)/2 items to find the matching item on positive trials (where n is the number in the memory set) but will need to search through all n for positive trials
o Serial exhaustive search- search ends when all items from list are exhausted. This is what humans do.
Number of comparisons that can be made in a second is equal to 25
Search is exhaustive because the comparison process itself is so fast that it is more efficient to complete the search through all the items than to stop after each comparison to make a decision
However, other researchers found evidence for parallel search through visual displays, and evidence for serial self-terminating search through long term memory
What are the 4 stages proposed by Sternberg for the memory scanning task?
- Stimulus quality:
a. Stimulus probe degradation- mean some manipulation that makes the probe more difficult to see
i. Sternberg found that degradation only affects stage 1 but not stage 2 - Size of positive set
- Response type (positive or negative)- Takes longer to decide in favour of a negative to a positive
- Relative frequency of response time- more probable response is executed faster
What is Posner’s same/different classification task principle?
- Subjects are asked to classify pairs of stimuli as SAME or DIFFERENT on the basis of some criterion.
- As the abstractness increases, so do the number of stimuli that are considered identical
Describe the letter matching task
• Subject presented with letters of the alphabet and required to judge as quickly as possible whether pair is the same or different (uppercase and lowercase same letters (Aa) are considered to be SAME)
• Results evidence that subjects match physically identical stimuli on the basis of visual rather than name characteristics during simultaneous matching
• However, during successive matching, suggests that letters are being matched on the basis of name as matches like AA are not made faster than matches like Aa.
o This suggests that the duration of an efficient visual code for matching is short (2 seconds or longer and it is inefficient)
Posner experiment of matching pairs to vowel or consonant category concludes that subjects must have gone through these nodes (consonants were matched slower than vowels because there are more of them). So physical matching faster than name matching, which is faster than rule-based matching (vowels and consonants). These extractions occur in a serial fashion.
What are some methodological issues with mental chronometry?
• Irreducible minimum reaction time- minimum time for stimulus input, decision and motor response time. Reaction times shorter than that are called anticipations.
• Warning signal- indicates to subject that second stimulus (reaction signal) will occur after some time interval (foreperiod)
o Reaction times shorter than irreducible minimum are discarded. Less of a problem in choice reaction time.
• Long RTs are outliers that can be caused by lack of attention
• Speed-Accuracy Trade-Off function:
o The faster, the less accurate the response to a stimulus will be (stimulus A might receive a stimulus response meant for stimulus B)
As ling as error rates are positively correlated with RT, low chance that data can be explained by speed-accuracy trade-off function
• RT can be affected by a subject’s familiarity with the test matter (such as alphabets of different languages)
Why do we have to investigate cognitive processes so indirectly?
• Introspective data do not provide valid insight into the determinants of cognition
• Some cognitive processes occur without any conscious awareness or control and therefore are not available for introspection
• Even our consciously controlled cognitive processes are subject to a variety of “cognitive biases” and reasoning errors that influence our interpretation of events without our awareness
-We are influenced by framing
-Hindsight bias
-Adjustment and anchoring
-Misconceptions of regression
-Anchoring in the assessment of subjective probability distributions
-Conformation biases
-Biases due to the retrievability of instances
-Biases due to the effectiveness of a search set
-Biases of imaginability
-Illusory correlation
-We seek order in randomness and ignore chance
-Insensitivity to prior probability of outcomes
-We ignore base rates/sample size
-Insensitivity to predictability
-Many errors actually make us more efficient at processing information but means we cannot accurately report our own cognitive processes
-Certainty effect
-Pseudocertainty effect
What are the three key processes involved in memory?
• Three key processes involved in memory;
o Encoding
Forming a memory code
Requires attention
o Storage
Maintaining encoded information in memory over time
o Retrieval
Recovering information from memory stores
What is attention?
focusing awareness on a narrowed range of stimuli or events
What is inattentional blindness?
when we are so focused on one thing that we are blind to everything else
-e.g. phones and roads
Attention is limited due to the fact that we have limited “attentional resources”. So what can we do?
Either focus these on one task and not process anything else OR
Spread our attentional resources across many tasks but perform each less well
The extent to which we can control our attention allows us to choose
What is diffused attention?
relaxed thinking state, once the brain settles into resting
What is focused attention?
a concentrated, focused form of thinking
What are the two locuses of selection and what is the evidence for each?
o Early locus of selection- information is selected or rejected on the basis of its physical characteristics (e.g. Broadbent’s filter model)
o Late locus of selection- information is selected or rejected on the basis of more complex characteristics like its meaning (e.g. Treisman’s attenuation model)
-Cocktail party. While having a conversation 35% of participants recognised their name in another conversation going on
Is the location of attention filter flexible or fixed? Why?
o Henceforth, concluded that the location of the attention filter is flexible rather than fixed
o Location would depend on cognitive load of current information processing.
When one is attending to complicated, high load tasks that consume much of one’s attentional capacity, selection tends to occur early.
However, when one is involved in simpler, low-load tasks, more attentional capacity is left over to process the meaning of distractions, allowing for later selection.
What is exogenous attention?
Involuntary, stimulus-driven
- When an object or feature pops out or captures our attention
- An easy parallel search
What is endogenous attention?
Voluntary, goal-directed
- When we try to find an object or feature
- An effortful and serial search
What is the 1986 Treisman’s feature integration theory?
Proposes that we process features independently in a preattentive manner (quickly and in parallel) and the role of attention is to bind these features together into objects (slow and serial)
What is feature search?
A single feature distinguishes a target from its neighbors (distractors). More efficient as target pops out quickly- doesn’t matter how many distractors there are
What is conjuction search?
Target has similarity with distractors, so as distractors increase, target becomes harder to find
What is change blindness?
o When we make a saccade (jumping eye movement) the input washes out motion sensors.
o This can be simulated by inserting blanks or flashes between pictures
What does change blindness imply?
o Implies that:
Our sense of experiencing a whole scene in one go is an illusion
We do not encode much information at all about what we are seeing
We must slowly pay attention to each individual part of the scene before the information is actually processed and we notice a difference
What is the impact of divided attention and why do we think we can multitask?
o We give ourselves the illusion that we can do highly practised tasks together with a few errors because:
The processes become automatic
The way the processes are performed is more efficient
Errors are less likely to be noticed because we are not paying attention
o But we actually can’t- e.g. texting while driving
o Divided attention actually leads to less productivity and less efficiency
What are the three different types of memory and their function?
- Sensory memory- Iconic and echoic: literal copies of sensory events
- Short-term memory: “buffer” for the temporary maintenance of information
- Long-term memory: facts, episodes and procedures
What can sensory memory do?
• When things first come in the system
• Sensory memory preserves information in its original sensory form for a brief time, usually only a fraction of a second
• Literal copies of visual and auditory events
• Has unlimited capacity
o Sperling (1960) found subjects could report 3-4 items if asked to recall all of them (whole report) but any 3-4 if only asked to report a single row (partial report)
• Allows the sensation of a visual pattern, sound or touch to linger for a brief moment after the sensory stimulation is over
• People perceive an afterimage rather than the actual stimulus
• Brief preservation of sensations in sensory memory is adaptive in that it gives additional time to try to recognise stimuli
=-Passive and effortless
What is iconic memory?
o Iconic
Visual memory
Information lasts 50-500 ms
Sperling evidence
What is echoic memory?
o Echoic Auditory memory Information lasts 8-10 s Auditory info isn’t useful unless we have a longer buffer as it is given sequentially, while visual information can be given in a parallel fashion Auditory not as big
What is short term memory
• Limited capacity store that can maintain unrehearsed information for about 10-20 seconds
What is rehearsal and what will it enable you to do?
Rehearsal- the process of repetitively verbalizing or thinking about the information
Rehearsal enables for information to be kept in the short term store indefinitely
Why is short-term memory thought to depend primarily on phonemic encoding?
Due to its reliance on recitation
What is George Miller’s thesis?
The magical number seven, plus or minus two
We possess a finite and small capacity for making unidimensional judgements and this capacity doesn’t vary a great deal from one simple sensory attribute to another
Number seven only applies to one-dimensional judgements
The addition of independently variable attributes to the stimulus increases channel capacity but at a decreasing rate (with decreased accuracy)
Kaufman experiment with subjects counting number of dots- below seven, subitised, above seven, subjects estimated the count and made more errors
Span of absolute judgement- limit to the accuracy with which we can identify absolutely the magnitude of a unidimensional stimulus variable
Absolute judgement is limited by amount of information, while immediate memory is limited by number of items
Bits of information are recoded into chunks- for example, letters into words, words into phrases- recoding increases amount of info we can deal with
o When short term memory is filled to capacity, the insertion of new information “bumps out” some of the information currently in short term memory
o This can be detrimental for people that have to perform tasks in which they need to mentally juggle various pieces of information
What is a chunk and how does it help?
- A group of familiar stimuli stored as a single unit
- People can increase the capacity of their short-term memory by combining stimuli into chunks
- People routinely draw information out of their long-term memory banks to help them evaluate and understand information they’re working with in short term memory
Who made the working memory model and what does it include?
Baddeley
- Phonological loop
- Visuospatial sketchpad
- Central executive system
- Episodic buffer
What is the phonological loop and how does it work?
o Phonological loop- component at work when you use recitation to temporarily hold onto a piece of information
Memory span depends on how long it takes to repeat information e.g. word length and speech rate
Language differences in ‘digit span task’
Have to physically count words in sentence because phonological loop is busy saying sentence back to yourself
Repeat information verbally to memorise it
Encode things phonologically
What is the visuospatial sketchpad?
permits people to temporarily hold and manipulate visual images
What is the central executive system and how does it work?
o Central executive system- controls the deployment of attention, switching the focus of attention and dividing attention as needed
Manipulation of information, elaborative processing required for long-term retention, reasoning, planning
Attentional resources required to manipulate information in working memory
Coordinates the actions of other modules
What is the episodic buffer and how does it work?
o Episodic buffer- temporary, limited-capacity store that allows the various components of working memory to integrate information
Interface between working memory and long-term memory
What is working memory capacity and what can it influence?
Refers to one’s ability to hold and manipulate information in conscious attention
o Thought to be influenced by genetics
o Can be temporarily reduced by situational factors such as pressure to perform or excessive worry
o WMC can influence
Cognitive abilities
Reading comprehension
Musical ability
In terms of capacity, rate of forgetting and type of code, what is the difference between short term memory and long term memory?
Short-term memory:
Capacity: limited to 7+=2 items
Rate of forgetting: Decays within 20 seconds if not rehearsed
Type of code: Phonological
Long term memory-
Capacity: unlimited
Rate of forgetting: Forgetting due to interference rather than decay
Type of code: semantic
What are the serial position effects in short term recall?
o Primacy information transferred to long term memory
Because by end of trial/ sentence/list, the first information received has been dumped into the long term memory
o Recency information “dumped” from short term buffer
When there is no interval between the stimulus presented and the time for response
Who was Henry Molaison?
• HM- Henry Molaison: surgery on hippocampus to treat epilepsy
o No further acquisition of new information but existing memory retained
o Could not consolidate information into his long term memory
Who was Clive Wearing?
• Clive Wearing:
o Cannot consolidate short-term memory, also missing long-term memory
o Memory span is approx. 20-30 seconds
o No conscious long term memory
What is long term memory?
an unlimited capacity store that can hold information over lengthy period of time
What is the non-declarative memory system?
actions and motor skills
What is declarative memory system and what two other memory systems does it include?
factual information
Includes:
-Semantic memory system
-Episodic memory system
What is the semantic memory system?
Semantic memory system- general knowledge, stored undated
• Explicit knowledge of the meanings of words, facts, ideas
• A sense of ‘knowing’ rather than remembering
What is the episodic memory system?
Episodic memory system- dated recollections of personal experiences
• Explicit memory
• Your memory of your life history
o Important occasions such as birthdays
o Specific memories of learning new things
• Most people have an intact memory for the explicit meaning of concepts, but amnesia for the source of the meaning
What is conceptual hierarchy and what did Bousfield do?
• Conceptual hierarchy- a multilevel classification system based on common properties among items
o Bousfield- asked subjects to memorize a list of 60 words which belong to four categories- showed subjects recalling this list engage in clustering: participants tended to remember them in bunches that belonged to same category
o Linking things together is good to increase memory
o Way we store our memories is unique to us
What is schema and how does it work?
• Schema- an organised cluster of knowledge about a particular object or event abstracted from previous experience with the object or event
o Generalised mental representations, or concepts, describing a class of objects, people, scenes or events
o Schemas make memory encoding more efficient
But they also distort experiences and perceptions as all kinds of information is forced into an existing schema
Even information which does not fit into the schema is affected by it, as it then becomes an exception to the schema
What did Brewer and Treyens do in their work for schema?
o Brewer and Treyens- showed photo of office and took it away asked subjects to describe them subjects described things normally found in office setting but forgot what wasn’t some thought things normally in office setting that weren’t there actually were there
o People are more likely to remember things that are consistent with their schemas than things that are not
o People sometimes exhibit better recall of things that violate their schema-based expectations
What was the Barlett “War of Ghosts” experiment?
o Bartlett “War of Ghosts experiment”
Picked a story culturally unfamiliar to people so that people would try to impose their schemas
People stopped being accurate and associated words to culture
• E.g. something black came from his mouth he vomited
Hard to interpret items were omitted
What are some examples of schema?
Stereotypes:
• “person schemas” are used for ease of understanding
• Counter-stereotypes actually reinforce the stereotype, making the counter-stereotype as an exception in people’s minds
o Gender counterstereotypes in video games, the noble savage…
• Gender schemas in movies
o The Bechdel test:
The movie has to have at least two women who talk to each other about something besides a man
• Childhood formation of schemas
o Colour-schemed toys and television
• Prejudice vs discrimination:
o Prejudice- when you think a certain thing but don’t act upon it
o Discrimination- when you stop people doing things for a certain characteristic
What are scripts?
Scripts- Generalised mental representations of events in time
Sequence of events that you do at a particular place
• At lectures, sit, take notes, leave.
• Morning- eat breakfast, get dressed, leave
What does the structure of schemas in long term memory govern?
- How you perceive events happening in front of you
- How you encode and remember what you have experienced
- The expectations you have of everything: people, events, the world…
- How well you cope
What do semantic networks consists of?
- Consists of nodes representing concepts, joined together by pathways that link related concepts
- Length of each pathway represents the degree of association between two concepts
- Models built as webs to simulate neuron structure
Who were supporters of the semantic networks?
Collins and Quillian (1969) and Collins and Loftus (1972)
What is spreading activation?
When people think about a word, their thoughts naturally go to related words called spreading activation
Strength of this activation decreases as it travels outwards
What is cognitive economy?
each concept/property only stored once no redundancy
This is honestly not viable there is always redundancy in the human mind
What is a superset relationship?
Superset relationships-broad categories and their relationship to each other
-Properties are stored at highest level of network
What does spreading activation do?
o Spreading activation retrieves meaning
Presenting a concept leads to “activation” of the appropriate node and to a spread of activation to related nodes
If two concepts are related, spreading activation from two concepts will “intersect”
Time to verify sentence depends on distance between concepts (plus time to evaluate intersection)
Sentence verification time a function of distance between concepts in hierarchical network
Which is slower: retrieving properties or retrieving supersets?
Retrieving properties
What is time to verify affected by in hierarchical networks?
Time to verify is affected by:
- Semantic distance between nodes
- The strength of the initial activation
- The amount of time since the initial activation
What are the flaws in the hierarchical model?
Typicality effects
-People take longer to make decisions about less typical examples
Category size effects:
Individual knowledge: -People with different specialised knowledge will take shorter times making connections people specialised in other things would and vice versa
-Depends a lot on individual knowledge
What is the connectionist models and what does it consist of?
o Connectionist or parallel distributed processing models assume that cognitive processes depend on patterns of activation in highly interconnected computational networks that resemble neural networks- memories are meant to be stored by particular patterns of activation
o Consists of:
A large network of interconnected computing units (nodes) that operate much like neurons
• Nodes may be inactive or may send either excitatory or inhibitory signals to other units
o PDP models assert that specific memories correspond to particular patterns of activation
Every new event changes the strength of connections among relevant units by altering the connection weights
Consequently, you are likely to respond differently the next time you experience a similar event
What is parallel distributed processing?
- Human brain appears to depend extensively on parallel distributed processing
- Parallel distributed processing is the simultaneous processing of the same information that is spread across networks of neurons
Why do we forget, and who proposed this?
• Schacter-you need to forget information that is no longer relevant
o Forgetting can reduce competition among memories that would otherwise cause confusion
o Scientists used brain-imaging technology to track neural markers of cognitive effort in a series of tasks in which participants memorized pairs of words
o Found that the forgetting of words pairs deemed irrelevant made it easier to remember the relevant word pairs and reduced the demands placed on crucial neural circuits
What did Ebbinghau do?
Ebbinghau’s forgetting curve-
• Invented nonsense syllables (meaningless words)
• Memorised the syllables and tested his memory of these lists after various time intervals
• Found a forgetting curve- graphs retention and forgetting over time
• He concluded that most forgetting occurs very rapidly after learning something
o However, recent studies have found that the curve isn’t that deep- because we are learning something meaningful
How do we measure forgetting?
Three principle methods used to measure forgetting-
- Recall
- Recognition
- Relearning
What is retention?
The proportion of material remembered
What is the retention interval?
The length of time between the presentation of materials to be remembered and the measurement of forgetting
What is recall measure of retention?
Requires subjects to reproduce information on their own without any cues
What is recognition measure of retention?
• Recognition measure of retention- Requires subjects to select previously learned information from an array of options
o Evidence shows that recognition measures tend to yield higher scores than recall measures of memory for the same information
o Luh- measured subject’s retention of nonsense syllables with both a recognition test and a recall test. Proved this.
o However, difficulty of recognition tests can vary greatly depending on the number, similarity and plausibility of the options provided as possible answers.
What is relearning measure of retention?
Requires a subject to memorize information a second time to determine how much time or how many practice trials are saved by having learned it before
Why do we forget?
- Ineffective encoding
- Decay
- Interference theory
- Retrieval failure
- Motivated forgetting
Describe ineffective encoding
• Ineffective encoding
o Pseudoforgetting- when forgetting may only appear to be forgetting as the information never went into the mind in the first place
Usually attributable to lack of attention
o Forgetting may be the result of ineffective or inappropriate encoding
Some approaches to encoding lead to more forgetting than others
• Phonemic encoding- when you’re only saying the words to yourself
• For example being distracted while reading the textbook
• Inferior to semantic encoding
o Stimuli processed in a “shallow” manner is better remembered than more “deeply” processed stimuli
What involves memory decay?
o Decay theory attributes forgetting to the impermanence of memory storage
o Proposes that forgetting occurs because memory traces fade with time
o Assumes that decay occurs in the physiological mechanisms responsible for memories
o According to decay theory, the mere passage of time produces forgetting
However, researches have repeatedly found that time passage is not as influential as what happens during the time interval
Research has shown that forgetting depends not on the amount of time that has passed since learning but on the amount, complexity and type of information that subjects have had to assimilate during the retention interval.
Interference- the negative impact of competing information on retention
What is the interference theory and the experiments involved? (McGeoch and McDonald)
• Interference theory-
o People forget information because of competition from other material
o Interference is assumed to be greatest when intervening material is most similar to test material
o Many studies changed the degree of similarity between the original material given to the subjects and the material studied in the intervening period
McGeoch and McDonald-
• Subjects memorize test material that consisted of a list of two syllable adjectives
• Varied the similarity of intervening learning by having subjects then memorize one of 5 lists that had increasing similarity to test material
• Found that as similarity of intervening material decreased, amount of forgetting also decreased due to the reduced interference
o Two kinds of interference-
Retroactive interference- occurs when a new information impairs the retention of previously learned information
• Occurs between the original learning and the retest on that learning, during the retention interval
• McGeoch and McDonald- retroactive interference
Proactive interference- occurs when previously learned information interferes with the retention of new information
• Rooted in learning that comes before exposure to the test material
What is retrieval failure and the experiments involved?
• Retrieval Failure-
o Retrieval failures may be more likely when a mismatch occurs between retrieval cues and the encoding of the information you’re searching for
Encoding specificity principle- the value of a retrieval cue depends on how well it corresponds to the memory code
o Another line of research- indicates that memory is influenced by the “fit” between the processing during encoding and retrieval
Transfer-appropriate processing- occurs when the initial processing of information is similar to the type of processing required by the subsequent measure of retention
Morris, Bransford, Franks-
• Gave subjects a list of words and a task that required either semantic or phonemic processing
• Retention was measured with recognition tests that emphasised either the meaning or the sound of the words
• Semantic processing yielded higher retention when the testing stressed semantic factors, while phonemic processing yielded high retention when the testing stressed phonemic factors
What is motivated forgetting and who is responsible for that theory?
• Motivated forgetting-
o Freud’s theory
o Repression- refers to keeping distressing thoughts and feelings buried in the unconscious
o A number of experiments suggest that people don’t remember anxiety-laden material as quickly as emotionally neutral material
What is the recovered memories controversy?
o People accuse other people of abuse (such as parents, teachers… ) based on “repressed” memories, unearthed through the strong suggestions of psychologists who seek to explain their emotional problems
o Complicated issue because in the absence of corroborative evidence, there is no way to reliably distinguished genuinely recovered memories from false ones
o E.g. with the help of a church counsellor, one woman recovered memories of how her minister father had repeatedly raped her, got her pregnant and then aborted the pregnancy with a coat hanger, even though the woman was revealed to still be a virgin and that her father had had a vasectomy years before
o Also extremely easy to plant new memories in people
What is the Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm?
o Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm-
o Series of lists of 15 words are presented to participants
o They are asked to recall the words immediately after each list is presented and are given a recognition measure of their retention at the end of the session
o The trick is that each list consists of a set of words (frigid, ice, artic) that are strongly associated with another target words not on the list (cold)
o When subjects recall the words on each list, they remember the nonpresented target word over 50% of the time, and when they are given the final recognition test, they typically indicate that about 80% of the nonstudied target words were presented in the list
o This doesn’t work on savants (such as Kim Peek) as their lack of conceptual encoding improves their memory
o Henceforth, using the Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm, false memories can be created reliably in normal, healthy participants in a matter of minutes, with no pressure or misleading information
o Memory errors can be made to items activated through “spreading activation” in semantic memory
Why do we have false memory?
o Leading questions and wording of questions
o Misleading information integrated with original memory and permanently overwrites it
o Source confusion
o Social pressure
o Fitting memory to schemas and scripts
o Hypnosis improves confidence but not memory
o Misinformation paradigm Loftus (1974)- shopping mall experiment
o Loftus told parents to tell children that they had been lost in shopping mall
o Reconstructed a story around it
o Subjects remembered false memories of them being lost in a shopping mall
What are flashbulb memories, and how confident are people about them?
-Unusually vivid and detailed recollections of the circumstances in which people learned about momentous, newsworthy events
o Where they were
o What they were doing
-People are very confident about their memories
-May be more remembered as they are rehearsed more
What is confabulation and why do we do it?
• Personal memories also decay
o Confabulate so that we have a coherent sense of self
Unaware that you have provided incorrect information
A ‘filling in’ of the blanks
To preserve self-image, image of control, completeness, coherence
Errors in retrieval accompanied by errors in monitoring (frontal lobe issues)
o Cannot tell whether a memory is true or false if there are no witnesses
o Just because you remember the senses when you had the memory doesn’t mean it’s true.
What did Bohannon (1988) test?
• Bohannon (1988) tested people’s memory for the Challenger disaster and found 77% recall after two weeks, 58% recall after 8 months
Who is Neisser (1982) and what did he recall?
• Neisser (1982) recalled vividly hearing the baseball on the radio being interrupted by the news of the bombing of Pearl Harbor but it wasn’t even baseball season
Describe the study in 2009 by Conway, Skitka, Hemmerich and Kewshaw
-Study in 2009 by Conway, Skitka, Hemmerich and Kershaw found that memories decay by giving test about 9/11 in 2001, 2002 and 2003.
o Events, such as giving blood, were remembered more than things like the time they heard about it or who first called them about it-unusual over inane.
What does declarative (explicit memory) do?
Declarative memory-
-Handles factual information
What are examples of declarative memory vs procedural memory
Declarative memory-
words, definitions
Procedural memory-
-riding a bike, typing
-person’s tensing up in response to sound of dental drill
-learn by doing it-not verbalizable
-hard to verbalize 3D space and exactly how you feel
What is the effort required to encode for declarative memory
Declarative memory-
-Recall of factual information generally depends on conscious, effortful processes
What is the difference in forgetfulness between declarative memory vs procedural memory
Declarative memory-
-More vulnerable to forgetting
Procedural memory-
-Doesn’t decline much over long retention intervals
What part handles declerative memory?
-Appears to be handled by the medial temporal lobe memory system and the far-flung areas of the cortex with which it communicates
What does procedural memory do?
- Houses memory for actions, skills, conditioned responses and emotional responses
- Unconscious associations between stimuli
- Gradually built over time
What is the difference in effort required to encode procedural memory
Procedural memory-
- Memory for conditioned reflexes is largely automatic and memories for skills often require little effort and attention
- May be disrupted by attention
What parts handle procedural memory?
Difficult to determine, but cerebellum and amygdala appear to contribute
What is procedural/implicit memory vulnerable to?
Is vulnerable to priming-
Display or mention of one concept leads to ‘spreading activation’ to other related concepts
Can prime people to slightly change their way of thinking
e.g. mentioning robbery before saying the sentence “He walked towards the bank”
What is an explicit memory task?
- Know your memory is being tested
- e.g. free recall and recognition
- subjects explicitly told to remember items from previous list engage in intentional retrieval
What is an implicit memory task?
Don’t know memory is being tested
- Not told to try to remember, just to perform a task
- e.g. fragment completion, stem completion, perceptual identification
- priming
Is explicit memory better for more deeply processed items?
Yes
Is implicit memory better for more deeply processed items?
No-
Implicit memory not better for more deeply processed items- can be better following perceptual than semantic coding
-Strong focus on physical characteristics: if changed font or capitals, wouldn’t be as strong
Does stimulus modality/format at encoding and retrieval (such as font and capitals) matter in implicit or explicit memory?
In implicit memory
Over delay, is explicit memory or implicit memory preserved more
Implicit memory
Is implicit or explicit memory better preserved in patients?
Implicit memory
What is the difference between declarative or procedural memory in terms of encoding and retrieval-
Declarative memory- Conceptual Encoding: Elaboration (create linkages, chunks...) Retrieval: Recollection (grasp around for retrieval cues) Procedural memory- Perceptual Encoding: Activation Retrieval: Familiarity
What are the similarities and differences of the different types of declarative memory- semantic vs episodic
Semantic memory-
-General knowledge that is not tied to the time when the information was learned
Episodic memory-
-Made up of chronological recollections of personal experiences
Similarities-
-Have distinct seperate neural bases
-Suggest retrieval of episodic and semantic memories provide different- but overlapping patterns of activation
What is infantile amnesia and why does it occur?
• Almost no memories from the first three years of life
• Could be because of:
o Trauma theory (Freud)
o Underdeveloped emotional encoding
Episodic memory may not have developed
o Neurological causes
o Underdeveloped or incomplete schema or events or self-schema
What is the reminiscence bump and why does it occur?
- Reminiscence bump
- A surprisingly large number of memories coming from the years 10 and 30 (or 15-25) see Rubin, Rahhal and Poon
- Not just personal memories either
- This could be because it is the time you engage in society and the first time you do a lot of stuff
Does motivation to remember help at encoding or retrieval?
Encoding
How can we remember better?
- Attitudes to study/Effort
- Use context
- Avoid interference
- Study at the best time of the day for you
- Deep encoding
- Avoid distractions
- Prepare before lectures and tutorials
- Evaluate your study technique
What influences effort?
-Self-schema: strengths, weaknesses, age
Why is context useful and what is included in context? What did Godden and Baddeley do in 1975?
Retrieval is best when encoding and retrieval MATCH
• Mood
o Bad mood- only remember bad things
• Time and place
• Thoughts and feelings
• Smells
• Images
• Nature of task
Godden and Baddeley (1975)
• Asked participants to learn words either on land or 20 feet underwater
• Were asked to later recall the words on land or underwater
o Recall was best when the contexts matched
o Recognition was unaffected by context
What is interference, and is similarity important in interference?
- Interference is competition from other material
- Similarity is important
What is retroactive interference?
-New material affects old material
What is proactive interference?
-Old material affects new material
What is deep encoding and what happens?What did Brandsford and Johnson find (1972)?
Don’t just hoard materials
Don’t offload get comfortable by putting your memory on external storage because it actually reduces organic memory (Storm and Stone and Benjamin study)
• Offload on phone instead of experiencing the event
• Comfort= reduced memory
Ask questions/ elaboration of material
Structure material semantically
Self-referent encoding
Reading the same information from different sources and authors
Semantic structuring of information allows for more effective chunking, and allows you to relate the information you are trying to learn to what you know
Elaboration creates more retrieval cues
Brandsford and Johnson (1972)-
• Balloon text vs picture
o People who were shown the picture before the text remembered more than just those with the text
o Memory and understanding is doubled if you understand the context beforehand
o Repetition without understanding doesn very little
What conditions, in terms of distractions, are best for study?
Silence is best
• Music interferes as much as speech (Perham and Vizard 2011)
Seek serenity before or after study periods
• Sleep
• Walk/jog with phone switched off
Why is our processing speed affected when we age?
• Neurons die across our lifespan and myelination is reduced, affecting processing speed
Why does it seem that we forget more as we grow older? What study showed this?
• Encoding and retrieving memories (particularly in new areas) requires effort across the entire lifespan
• Attributions change across the lifespan
• However, you forget things at the same rate as 20 year old than as a 60 year old
• Recall requires effort- as you get older, stop trying as hard as you think it’s fruitless and that you’re extremely old
• Aging and attitudes, and memory-
o American schema of “old people”
Slow, forgetful, frail
o Chinese schema of “old people”
Friendly, kind, wise
Langer and Levy (1994)
o Rahal, Hasher and Colcombe (2001)
Memory task where half the subjects were told it was testing memory ability and the other half were told it was assessing their ability to learn trivia
Did worse in the memory task than the trivia task, even though they were exactly the same
What is a free recall task?
report items from earlier study episode
What is a recognition task and what makes them easy/hard
• Recognition task- select previously studied items from mixture of old and new items
o Recognition task provides a cue that can activate the memory network
o However, cues may prime the wrong information
o MC questions can be harder because you have to discriminate between exactly right and nearly right answers wrong answer might activate an incorrect memory
o Need to have processed elaborately to retrieve related information and choose correct answer
What are ways to improve everyday memory?
- Engage in adequate rehearsal
- Test yourself
- Overlearn material
- Schedule distributed practice and minimize interference
- Engage in deep processing and organise information
- Mnemonic devices
Why does rehearsal help, and what forms of rehearsal are useless?
o Practice leads to improved retention
o Rehearsal helps transfer information into long term memory
o Rereading- good for recall but unclear if it helps with comprehension
Low utility as inefficient compared to other techniques
o Summarisation-low utility
o Highlighting- low utility
What does testing yourself do, and what studies were done on this?
o Testing effect- testing actually enhances retention
Studies have shown that taking a test on material increases performance on a subsequent test even more than studying for an equal amount of time
The testing effect was observed in both closed book and open book exams
• Roediger and Karpicke (2006)
• Experiment 1:
o Considered prose passages (~260 words)
o Participants:
Studied for 7 minutes; then studied for 7 minutes OR
Studied for 7 minutes; then ‘tested’ for 7 minutes
• Recall test was just a blank sheet with the title of the passage
• Recall test 5 minutes, 2 days and 7 days after:
o 5 minutes after, study study technique worked
o 2 days and 7 days, it worked a lot less than study test technique
• Experiment 2-
o Four study/test periods instead of two
o SSSS, SSST or STTT
After 5 minutes, those who studied loads did better, but after 1 week, those who tested loads did better
If participants are provided feedback on test performance, favourable effects of testing are enhanced
Forces students to engage in effortful retrieval of information which promotes future retention
• Even unsuccessful retrieval efforts can enhance retention
What is overlearning and what study was done on it?
o Overlearning- continued rehearsal of material after you first appear to have mastered it
Krueger- after subjects had mastered a list of nouns, Krueger required them to continue rehearsing for 50% or 100% more trials
• Measuring retention at intervals up to 28 days,Krueger found that greater overlearning was related to better recall of the list
Although extremely good as a weekly thing, evidence on its long term benefits (months later) is inconsistent
o
What is the serial position effect?
occurs when subjects show better recall for items at the beginning and end of a list than for items in the middle
Is retention better after distributed practice or massed practice?
Distributed practice
If the retention material is longer, should there be a longer or shorter break between practice trials?
Longer
How can you minimise interference?
Study the thing you need to remember before the test
Does placing meaning to what you’re learning increase retention?
Yes
What is less critical to retention: How often you go over material or the depth of processing you engage in?
How often you go over material
What does outlining force you to do?
Organize material hierarchically
What are different types of mnemonic devices and what are they?
o Acrostics- phrases (or poems) in which the first letter of each word (or line) functions as a cue to help you recall information to be remembered
o Acronym- a word formed out of the first letters of a series of words. Takes advantage of chunking
o Rhymes
o Link method- involves forming a mental image of items to be remembered in a way that links them together
o Method of loci- involves taking an imaginary walk along a familiar path where images of items to be remembered are associated with certain locations
Ensures that items are remembered in their correct order because the order is determined by the sequence of locations along the pathway
Pathway from home to work more effective than pathway through one’s home
What is in the central nervous system?
- Brain
- Spinal cord
What is the structure and function of the spinal cord?
o Spinal cord
Long thin structure attached to the base of the brain and running the length of the spinal column
• Bundle of axons travelling up to the brain
Cable of neural fibres with spinal roots branching off
Sensory nerves coming in, motor nerves going out
• Transmits sensory information to the brain or uses motor nerve to travel out to the body
An interface between the brain and peripheral nervous system
• Directly connected to sensory, motor and autonomic nerves
What is grey matter?
portions of the central nervous system that are abundant in cell bodies of neurons rather than axons. The colour appears grey relative to white matter
What is white matter?
portions of the central nervous system that are abundant in axons rather than cell bodies of neurons. The color derives from the presence of the axons’ myelin sheaths
How many neurons is the CNS estimated to contain?
100 billion neurons
