Types of Long Term Memory Flashcards
Who proposed the idea of three memory stores?
Tulving was one of the first cognitive psychologists to realise that the multi-store model’s view of LTM was too simplistic and inflexible. Tulving proposed that there are in fact three LTM stores, containing quite different types of information.
What are the three types of long term memory?
Episodic
Semantic
Procedural
What is episodic memory?
- Episodic memory refers to our ability to recall personal events (episodes) from our lives.
- The memories tend to be explicit (conscious).
- They are time stamped meaning we remember when they happened e.g. recently or last week and what happened
- your memory of a single episode will include several elements, such as people and places, objects and behaviours which are all interwoven to produce a single memory.
- have to make a conscious effort to recall episodic memories - we can do this quickly but we are still aware that we are searching for our memory of what happened when you went to the dentist
What is an example of an episodic memory?
What I had for lunch yesterday
What is semantic memory?
- This store contains our knowledge of the world. This knowledge of the world is shared by everyone rather than the personal kind of knowledge that is classed as episodic memories.
- Semantic memories may relate to things, such as the functions of objects, social customs, mathematics and language.
- Memories tend to be explicit (conscious)
- Your semantic memory contains your knowledge of a number of concepts such as: animals, ‘Frozen’ and love. These memories are not ‘time-stamped’. We don’t usually remember when we first heard about the ‘Frozen’ film.
- Semantic knowledge is less personal and more about facts we all share. However semantic memory is about much more than just ‘facts’. It contains an immense collection of material which, given its nature is constantly being added to.
Example of semantic memory
What an orange tastes like
What is procedural memory?
- This is our memory for actions, or skills, or basically how we do things.
- We can recall these memories without conscious awareness (implicit) or a great deal of effort.
- Procedural memories are typically acquired through repetition and practice.
- We are less aware of these memories because they become automatic.
- If you try to think too much about procedural memories it prevents you from acting them out.
Example of procedural memory
How to drive a car
What are the differences between semantic memory and episodic memory?
- Semantic memory is general knowledge about the world but episodic memory is our personal experiences
- Semantic memories are not usually time stamped whereas episodic memories are
What are the similarities between semantic memory and episodic memory?
- They are both associated with the hippocampus
- Both memories tend to be explicit
What are the differences with episodic and procedural memory?
- Episodic memory is associated with the hippocampus and other parts of the temporal lobe, procedural memory is associated with the cerebellum and motor cortex
- Episodic memory is explicit and can easily verablise whereas procedural memory is implicit, difficult to verbalise
What are differences with semantic and procedural memory?
- Semantic memories are explicit and can be verbalised easily, procedural memories are implicit and are hard to verbalise
- Semantic memory is associated with the hippocampus and other parts of the temporal lobe, procedural memory is associated with the cerebellum and motor cortex
Evaluation - clinical evidence
One strength is evidence from the famous case studies of HM and Clive Wearing. Episodic memory in both men was severely impaired due to brain damage, caused by an operation and an infection. But their semantic memories were relatively unaffected. They still understood the meaning 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 talk and walk, and Clive Wearing, a professional musician, knew how to read music and play 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.
Evaluation - clinical evidence counter point
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 has no way of controlling what happened to the participant before or during the injury meaning the researcher has no knowledge of the individual’s 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.
Evaluation - neuroimaging evidence
One limitation is that there are conflicting research findings linking types of LTM to areas of the brain. Buckner and Peterson (1996) carried out a brain scan where participants performed various memory tasks whilst their brains were scanned using a PET scanner. They found that semantic memories were recalled from the left prefrontal cortex and episodic memories were recalled from the right prefrontal cortex. However, other research links the left prefrontal cortex with encoding of episodic memories and the right prefrontal cortex with episodic retrieval. This challenges any neurophysiological evidence to support types of memory as there is poor agreement on where each type might be located.
