Unit 10 - The Remembering Brain Flashcards
What is plasticity? What does it form the basis of? When is it strongest?
The brain’s ability to change because of experience
Memory
During childhood
What is short-term memory (STM)? What does it have that is limited?
Memory for information currently held “in mind”
Its capacity
What is long-term memory? How is its capacity? What two types of memory can it be divided into?
Memory for information that is stored but need not be consciously accessible
Essentially unlimited
Declarative and Nondeclarative Memory
Is the idea that short-term and long-term memory could be different types of memory (with different stores) evoked for different periods of time a misconception? Why?
Yes, this is a misconception.
Since psychologists do not distinguish between the two based on time.
Can short-term memory be regarded as a single entity? Is it essential for all long-term learning? Why, for both?
No, short-term memory cannot be regarded as a single entity, and is not essential for all long-term learning
Different types of short-term memory exist (e.g., verbal and viso-spatial), and can be held in mind concurrently.
Some types of long-term learning are possible despite impaired short-term memory
What is working memory?
A system for the temporary storage and manipulation of information
What are the three components of Baddeley and Hitch’s model of working memory? Why was the episodic buffer added to this model? What type of model is this?
2 storage components, one for verbal material (phonological loop) and one for visual material (visuo-spatial sketchpad)
3rd component, central executive, coordinates the storage components and cognition in general
For maintaining and manipulating information from episodic long-term memory
Of working memory
What is an alternative approach to short-term memory? How common is this approach?
- There are no short-term stores (e.g., no verbal/visual stores)
- Working memory is just the temporary activation of long-term memories
Most common
What is phonological short-term memory synonymous to? How is its capacity limitation studied?
Verbal working memory
Through span tasks
What are span tasks? What is reduced capacity in these tasks linked to? What does this imply?
Involve participants reading a sequence of, e.g., digits and then repeating them back immediately after brief retention
Problems in learning new words
That phonological STM may be important for new phonological LTM
What does the phonological/articulatory loop in span tasks involve?
A phonological store and a rehearsal mechanism (based on saying words in the head) that refreshes the store
What is articulatory suppression? What impact does it have on span capacity?
Silently mouthing words while performing some other task (typically a memory task)
Reduces it
What impacted the capacity limitation on visuo-spatial short-term memory tasks more, nr of visual features or nr of visual objects/locations?
The latter
What is declarative/explicit memory? What are the two types of memories it can be divided into?
Memories that can be consciously accessed and can hence typically be declared - things one knows they can tell others
Semantic and Episodic Memories
What is semantic memory? Example?
Conceptually-based knowledge about the world, including knowledge of people, places, the meaning of objects and words
Current president of NL
What is episodic memory? Example?
Memory of specific events in one’s own life
One’s feelings during an exam
What is nondeclarative/implicit memory? What are the two primary subdomains of this type of memory?
Memories that cannot be consciously accessed - things one knows they can show by doing
Procedural memory and perceptual representation systems
What is procedural memory (skill learning)? Why is it non-declarative?
Memory for skills such as riding a bike
Contents of memory are not amenable to verbal report
What are perceptual representation systems? Why are they memory systems? Where does evidence for perceptual learning come from?
Systems used by the brain for perceiving sounds, words, objects, etc.
Since they store knowledge of the perceptual world and are capable of learning
Priming
What is priming?
The fact that information is easier to access if it has recently been encountered
What is non-associative learning / habituation?
When there is a reduction in response to a specific stimulus after repeated exposures to it
What is regarded as personal semantic memory?
Facts about oneself
What is amnesia? Which types of memory does it affect and which does it not? What can cause amnesia?
The loss of memories such as facts, information, and experiences
Short-term memory is spared;
Non-declarative memory - spared;
Declarative memory - impaired;
Episodic memory - certainly impaired;
Semantic memory - typically impaired (learning maybe possible, but at a slower rate);
Anything damaging the brain, such as strokes, head injuries, drugs, traumatic events, Alzherimer’s, viral infections
What is meant by amnesia being a heterogeneous disorder?
That patients differ in terms of severity and qualitative aspects
What is anterograde memory?
Memory for events that occurred after brain damage
What is anterograde memory?
Memory for events that occurred before brain damage
What was the case of a famous patient H.M.?
Relatively intact retrograde memory but very impaired anterograde memory
What is the typical pattern of memory loss for patients with amnesia?
Relatively spared memories for early life, becoming increasingly impaired as data of brain injury approaches. Around the date of brain injury, on, and after, memories are highly impaired.
What is Ribot’s law? How is it explained?
The observation that memories from early in life tend to be preserved in amnesia
Older the event the more consolidated it is and the less reliant it is on the hippocampus
What is consolidation? How does it explain that events shortly before brain injury may be impaired?
The process by which moment-to-moment changes in brain activity are translated into permanent structural changes
Since it happens gradually, meaning that those memories did not have time to be entirely consolidate
What are the three theories of how memories are established?
Consolidation theory
Multiple-trace theory
Cognitive map theory
What does the consolidation theory state about the effect of the initial formation of memories?
That it involves an increase in the probability that the postsynaptic neuron will fire in response to neurotransmitters released from a presynaptic neuron
What is long-term potentiation?
An increase in the long-term responsiveness of a postsynaptic neuron in response to stimulation of a presynaptic neuron
What does consolidation theory state about the transfer of memory over time? Why do some believe that new memories are not transferred directly to the neocortex?
That memory is slowly transferred from the hippocampus to the cortex
Since this may significantly distort old memories
Damage to what area support the consolidation theory and why?
Anterior temporal lobes, since these are assumed to be part of the storage site after memories have been consolidated
Damage to this area shows a reverse temporal gradient (better recent than remote memory)
Better recent memory since hippocampus is unharmed and worse remote memory due to anterior temporal lobe damage
Does consolidation theory distinguish between consolidating episodic and semantic memories? Which brain region is linked to the acquisition of semantic memory?
No, they are both grouped under declarative memory starting in the hippocampus and subsequently in the neocortex
Entorhinal cortex
What did the multiple-trace theory initially state?
That the temporal gradients found within amnesia were due to multiple memory traces of the event being created whenever an event is retrieved, meaning that older events are protected from brain damage because of these multiple traces
What does the multiple-trace theory, or the trace transformation theory state about the hippocampus? How about the neocortex?
States that the hippocampus is involved in some permanent aspects of memory storage, specifically for contextualised memories
Neocortex holds schematic memories (semantic)
What does this theory state about the process of consolidation? Does this mean that contextualised memories are lost?
Consolidation does not involve transferring memories unchanged from one brain region to another, but rather transforming them over time from contextualised (episodic) to schematic (semantic)
Not necessarily
How does the multiple-trace theory explain the hippocampus’ bias towards more recent memories?
Recent memories contain more detailed contextual cues than recent ones
What does the cognitive map theory state about the hippocampus? What about the specialisations of its right and left hemispheres?
That it contains a spatial map of the environment
Right hippocampus - spatial memory
Left hippocampus - contextual details
What are place cells? Where are they found? What do they consequently support?
Neurons that respond when an animal is in a particular location in allocentric space
Hippocampus
The existence of a spatial map within the hippocampus, since putting them together could function as a map
What are grid cells?
Neurons that respond when an animal is in specific locations, forming a repeating grid-like pattern.
What is recognition memory? Example?
A memory test where participants decide if a stimulus was shown on a particular occasion.
E.g, participants are shown a list of words and then asked if a given word was on that list.
What is recall? Example?
Memory tests where participants recall previously seen stimuli without a full prompt.
E.g, participants recall a list of words in any order (free recall), in the given order (serial recall), or with a prompt (cued recall)
What are the two distinct mechanisms involved in recognition memory?
Familiarity and Recollection
What is familiarity?
Context-free memory in which the recognised item just feels familiar
What is recollection?
Context-dependent memory that involves remembering specific information from the study episode
Which mechanism are tests of recall claimed to depend on?
Recollection
Are recollection and familiarity thought to have separable neural processes? Which parts of the brain respond more to each?
Yes
Recollection - hippocampus. Familiarity - Perirhinal cortex (processes item representations)
Is forgetting more likely to be important for efficient use of memory or a design fault? What are the three, common stages of explaining forgetting?
The former
Encoding, storage, and retrieval
What is meant by a levels-of-processing account?
The idea that information that is processed semantically is more likely to be remembered than information that is processed perceptually
How is encoding linked to forgetting?
If information is not processed adequately at encoding, it is more likely to be forgotten
What is the encoding specificity hypothesis?
The idea that events are easier to remember when the context at retrieval is similar to the context at encoding
What are the two primary explanations for the mechanism type that leads to forgetting? Which explanation has more evidence?
Passive mechanism such as trace decay (memories spontaneously weakening)
Active mechanism such as interference/inhibition (memories weakening through interactions with each other or with strategic control processes)
Active mechanisms
What is retrieval-induced forgetting?
The retrieval of a memory causing active inhibition of similar competing memories
What is directed forgetting? Can this remain be impaired while leaving retrieval-induced forgetting intact? What does this suggest?
Forgetting arising because of deliberate intention to forget
Yes
A dissociation between voluntary and automatic forgetting
What region of the brain was linked to forgetting instructions?
Left and right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
What is the constructive memory approach?
The act of remembering construed in terms of making inferences about the past based on what is currency known and accessible
What is a false memory? What theory does it support? What is an explanation for it?
A memory that is either partly or wholly inaccurate but is accepted as a real memory by the person doing the remembering
The constructive memory approach
Features of the false item reactivating the stored features relating to true events
What are the five roles of the prefrontal cortex in long-term memory?
Memory Encoding
Monitoring and Memory Retrieval
Experiential States
Source Monitoring
Memory for Temporal Context
What could be the reason for the PFC’s involvement in long-term memory encoding? What does the ventrolateral PFC do? How about the dorsolateral?
Its role in selecting and maintaining information within working memory
Predicts subsequent remembering relative to forgetting
Manipulates information in working memory
What is the dorsolateral PFC’s contribution to monitoring and memory retrieval? When is it most active?
Evaluating what has been retrieved from long-term memory
When context must be recollected, When there is uncertainty
What are the experiential states?
Familiarity and Recollection
What is source monitoring? What is this process thought to involve?
The process by which retrieved memories are attributed to their original context
A conscious evaluation process
Which part of the PFC is specialised for temporal context? How has this been determined?
The orbitofrontal cortex
Lesions cause issues in temporal source monitoring but not in spatial source monitoring or standard memory recognition/recall tests.
What is confabulation? What lesions lead to it? What does this imply? What is an alternative theory?
A memory that is false and sometimes self-contradictory without an intention to lie
Orbitofrontal cortex lesions
Potential relation to temporal context confusion, blending different time periods
Impairment in neglecting irrelevant memories
