Types of Long term memory Flashcards
Describe episodic memory?
Episodic memory refers to our ability to recall events from our lives.
Some examples are - you most recent visit to the dentist.
Episodic memory is time stamped ( you remember when they happened as well as what happened).
Episodic memories also store information about how events relate to each other in time.
Second, your memory of a single episode will include several elements, such as people and places, objects and behaviors. All of these memories are interwoven to produce a single memory.
This you have to make a conscious effort to recall episodic memories. You do this quickly but you are still aware that you are searching for your memory of what happened when you went to the dentist.
Describe semantic memory?
This store contains our shared knowledge of the world. So it includes knowledge of such things as - how to apply to university, what an orange tastes like, what zombies eat for dinner and meaning of words.
Your semantic memory contains your knowledge of an impressive number of concepts such as animals, love.
These memories are not time stamped. We don’t usually remember when we first heard about the new film frozen .
Semantic knowledge is less personal and more about facts we all share.
According to Tulving it is less vulnerable to distortion and forgetting than episodic memory.
Describe procedural memory?
This is our memory for actions and skills or basically how we do things
We can recall theses memories without without conscious awareness or much effort.
A good example is driving a car. Our ability to do this becomes automatic through practice. We change the gear without having to recall how to. We indicate left or right without even realising we’ve done so.
These are all sorts of skills we might even find quite hard to explain to someone else. If you try to describe what you are doing s you drive the car, the task may become more difficult.
How is clinical evidence a strength of HM and Wearing?
One strength is from case studies of HM and Wearing.
Episodic memory in both men was severely impaired due ti brain damage. But their semantic memories were relatively unaffected. They still understood the meanings of words. For example HM could not recall stroking a dog half an hour earlier but he did not need to have the concept of ‘dog’ explained to him.
Their procedural memories were also intact. They both still knew how to walk and speak and Wearing a professional musician, knew how to read music, sing and play the piano.
This evidence supports Tulving’s view that there are different memory stores in LTM- one store can be damaged but other stores are unaffected.
What is a counterpoint for that?
Studying people with brain injuries can help researchers to understand how memory is supposed to work normally. But clinical studies are not perfect
A major limitation is that they lack control of variables. The brain injuries experienced by participants were usually unexpected.
The researcher had no way of controlling what happened to the participant before or during the injury.
The researcher has no knowledge of the individuals memory before the damage. Without this, it is difficult to judge exactly how much worse it is afterwards. This lack of control limits what clinical studies can tell us about different types of LTM
Why is conflicting neuroimaging evidence a limitation?
One limitation is that there are conflicting research findings linking types of LTM to areas of the brain.
For a example Buckner and Peterson reviewed evidence regarding the location of semantic and episodic memory. They concluded that semantic memory is located in the left side of the prefrontal cortex and episodic memory on the right.
However, other research links the left prefrontal cortex with episodic memories and the right prefrontal cortex with semantic memories (Tulving)
This challenges any neurophysiological evidence to support types of memory as there is poor agreement on where each type might be located.
Why is real world application a strength?
Another strength is that understanding types of LTM allows psychologist to help people with memory problems.
For example as people age they experience memory loss. But research has shown this seems to be specific to episodic memory- it becomes harder to recall memories of personal events/experiences that occurred relatively recently though past episodic memories remain intact.
Belleville et al devised an intervention to improve episodic memories in older people. The trained participants performed better on a test of episodic memory after training than a control group.
This shows that distinguishing between types of LTM enables specific treatments to be developed.
