Psych final exam Flashcards
what’s human memory?
stage theory: long term and short term memory = “working memory”
what’s the duration of memory?
long term: relatively permanent
short term: seconds to minutes
what’s the storage capacity for memory?
long term: infinite?
short term: 7+/-2 “chunks” (organized packets of information)
what’s the flow of information in memory?
- stimulus -> STM -> rehearsal -> LTM
what are two kinds of memory rehearsal?
maintenance- holds info in STM
elaborative- moves into to LTM
what’s the serial position effect in free recall?
primacy effect- early part of list recalled better than middle: recalled from LTM
recency effect- last part of list recalled better than middle: recalled from STM
what’s the psychological code between STM and LTM?
STM: phonological- based on speech sounds (ex. confuse “boat with coat”)
LTM: semantic - based on meaning (ex. confuse “boat” with “ship”)
what’s the neural code between STM and LTM?
STM: dynamic- pattern of activity among a group of cells
LTM: structural- pattern of connections within a group of cells
what’s trace consolidation?
what goes on during elaborative rehearsal- a memory trace changes from a dynamic to a structural pattern
what’s amnesia?
interruption of consolidation process
retrograde amnesia: events before trauma
anterograde amnesia: events after trauma
what’s forgetting for STM and LTM?
STM: DISplacement and/or decay
LTM: MISplacement and/or retrieval failure
proactive interference: old info affects new
retroactive interference: new info affects old
What leads to better memory?
depth processing
deeper more meaningful processing
- connected to notion of elaborative rehearsal
- Craik and Tulving 1975 experiment shows DP important for better memory
what is elaborative rehearsal?
connecting new info with existing knowledge to enhance long-term retention and recall
what LTM and STM?
long term vs short term “Working memory”
What’s episodic memory?
episodes, events with time and place
what’s generic/semantic memory?
facts, concepts and meanings
What’s explicit memory?
reference to prior learning experience, recall- “what were the words you just read?”
recognition- “circle the words you saw earlier”
what’s implicit memory?
no conscious awareness of remembering, do priming (read list of words than do tasks)
what’s declarative memory?
knowing that (mainly explicit)
- statements, using episodic and generic information
what’s procedural memory?
knowing how (mainly implicit)
- skills: riding a bike, playing and instrument
what’s retrieval?
encoding specificity principle
what’s a retrieval cue?
current stimulus that aids retrieval
any memory for an item has the item’s context too
context cues at retrieval should be as much possible like context at encoding
recall better in context where words are learned
What’s the Loftus and Palmer experiment? 1974
at least in part, memory involves reconstruction of remembered information, memory may be distorted by other information (smash group more likely to say they saw glass in pics)
what’s sensation?
basic, primitive mental state corresponding to energies in experience of world
what’s perception?
mental state corresponding to properties of objects and events, knowledge of world
What’s quality of sensation for doctrine of specific nerve energies (Johannes Muller, 1826)
visual auditory, touch, etc. depends on which nerve fibers are stimulated, not on stimulus itself
According to Muller, why are fibers of optic nerve are normally stimulated by light?
- may also be stimulated by pressure, electric current
- any stimulation will yield experience of light
according to Muller, what examples show any sensory experience must have corresponding set of nerve fibers?
experiences of brightness, color, loudness, pitch
what is light?
electromagnetic radiation
what’s electromagnetic spectrum from shortest to longest wavelength?
gamma rays, X-rays, ultraviolet, color, infrared, microwaves, radar, FM, TV, AM
What corresponds with intensity?
brightness
what corresponds with wavelength?
color
short = blue, medium = green, long = red
what’s in the retina?
consists of receptors (rods, cones) bipolar cells, ganglion cells
how do we see light?
light enters pupil, then passes through eyeball to retina: through ganglia, bipolars, then strike receptors
what’s the optic nerve?
bundle of axons of ganglion cells, leading out back of eye to brain (leaving blind spot)
what’s the fovea?
central depression in retina where cones are most densely packed, most acute vision
what are rods?
very sensitive, black/white, night vision, 120,000,000
what are cones?
less sensitive, color, daytime vision, mostly in fovea, 6,000,000
what are photoreceptors?
light sensitive neurons in the retina that produce action potentials when stimulated by light (rods and cones)
what are short-wavelength cone cells?
most sensitive to blue-ish light
what are medium-wavelength cone cells?
most sensitive to green-ish light
what are long-wavelength cone cells?
most sensitive to red-ish light
what are opponent processes?
excitation and inhibition, cone cells send action potentials to opponent process cells
what are black/white opponent process cells?
excited, you see white, inhibited, you see black
what are red/green opponent process cells?
excited, you see red, inhibited, you see green
what are blue/yellow opponent process cells?
excited, you see blue, inhibited, you see yellow
What’s the trichromatic theory?
Young-Helmoltz theory
all colors would be mixtures of blue, green, red based on response of those cone types
what’s the opponent-process theory?
there ARE cone types, but not blue, green and red. Short, medium, and long wavelength cones, colors come in opponent pairs, activation of wavelength cones may excite or inhibit cells
what’s lateral inhibition?
- neighboring receptor cells tend to inhibit each other
- result is exaggeration of contrasts: dark looks darker, light looks lighter
what’s brightness contrast?
neighboring regions of different brightness have their boundaries sharpened as their brightness/darkness difference is increased
What’s a retinal image?
stimulation of receptors produces sensations of brightness and colors, then light sensations must be interpreted as objects
For poverty of the stimulus, what’s wrong with proximal stimulus (retinal image)?
inadequate for knowing about distal stimulus (thing in the world)
what’s inversion?
image of object is upside-down on retina
what’s ambiguous- size and distance trade off?
close-up small object has same image size as far-off large object
what’s two-dimensional?
image is flattened and then curved, but objects are three-dimensional solids
where does perception happen?
Not the eye, the brain!
What’s depth perception according to Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894)?
retinal image + cues along with knowledge structures/inferences learned from experience –> percept
what are monocular depth cues?
only one eye needed
what’s linear perspective?
convergence point is far away
what’s interposition?
nearer objects will block farther objects
what’s relative size?
nearer objects cast larger retinal images than farther objects of same size
what’s unconscious inference?
best guess at what DISTAL stimulus PROBABLY caused the PROXIMAL stimulus (retinal image)
perception is always in the direction of the best inference
what’s learned to infer distance of object?
- points nearer to where lines converge are farther away
- retinal image: objects appear near to where lines converge (linear convergence cue)
- infer: DISTAL object must be far away
what can you use for size information?
- far off objects produce smaller retinal images
- retinal image: two objects appear to have the SAME retinal image size (relative size cue)
- infer: the farther-away DISTAL object must be LARGER
What’s form perception from a nativist view, Gestalt Psychologists?
retinal image + innate laws of organization -> percept
what are the principles of perceptual organization?
- grouping by proximity
- grouping by similarity
- good continuation
- closure
what’s the phi phenomenon?
- stimulus present in two location within short time interval is seen as one moving stimulus
- no moving stimulus though!
