Reconstructive Memory Flashcards
What is reconstructive memory approach concerned with?
What happens when information is stored and retrieved from memory.
What did Bartlett (1932) suggest memory was? 2
‘an imaginatic reconstruction’ of past events
influenced by attitudes and responses to the event occuring
The retrieval of stored memories involves…
an ‘active process’ of reconstruction with a range of information
What is serial reproduction?
like ‘chinese whispers’
one person tells the story to the next and then to the next etc. it changes
What story did bartlett use
the native american story ‘War of the Ghosts’
Why did Bartlett uses War of the Ghosts? 2
Because it was unfamiliar to the participants
different cultural origin
What was the story about 3
war, ghosts (spirits) and death
How many people did the story pass through in Bartletts study?
6
What did Bartlett find in regards to serial reproduction and repeated reproduction? 3
Once the story had been passed through 6 people it changed in particular ways.
shorter
became more like an english story and left out the native american parts
What is repeated reproduction?
The same participant retells the story on a number of occasions
What reason did Bartlett give for his findings?
People have schemas
What is a schema
Consists of all the information we have related to one thing
When we reconstruct memories what do we activate? 3
The schemas
We make use of the information in them
We have a schema for every aspect of the world
What schemas would we use in relation to war of the ghosts 3
the ghost schema
the war schema
the death schema
What did Bartletts participants do when they remembered the story
They scanned all the relevant schemas for more information and abandoned the information that didn’t fit into their understanding of ghosts etc
