Week 1 Flashcards
What’s some evidence that there is more to memory than just a single global memory system?
Amnesic patients are capable of a number of types of learning, even though they don’t remember learning them.
What is reductionism?
The view that all scientific explanations should aim to be based on a lower level of analysis.
What is verbal learning?
A term applied to an approach to memory that relies principally on the learning of list of words and nonsense syllables.
What is Gestalt Psychology?
An approach to psychology that was strong in Germany in the 1930s and that attempted to use perceptual principles to understand memory and reasoning.
What is a schema?
Proposed by Bartlett to explain how our knowledge of the world is structured and influences the way in which new information is stored and recalled.
What is a model?
A method of expressing a theory more precisely, allowing predictions to be made and tested.
What is the modal model?
Modal of how memory works. Goes environment, sensory memory. short-term memory, and LTM.
What is iconic memory?
A term applied to the brief storage of visual information.
What is working memory?
A memory system that underpins our capacity to “keep things in mind” when performing tasks.
What is Explicit memory?
Memory that is open to intentional retrieval, whether based on recollecting personal events or facts.
What is implicit memory?
Retrieval of information form LTM through performance rather than explicit conscious recall of recognition.
What are episodic memories?
Memories that refer to specific events we’ve experienced.
What are sematic memories?
Ones that refer to knowledge.
What is priming?
The process whereby presentation of an item influences the processing of a subsequent item, whether positively or negatively.
How are Gestalt psychology unlike behaviorist approaches?
Gestalt psychologists emphasized the importance of internal representations rather than observable stimuli and responses.
How is Bartlett’s approach to memory involving schemas different from Ebbinghaus’ approach?
Bartlett rejected the learning of meaningless material as a means of testing memory. He focused on people’s cultural assumptions about the world, based on schemas.
If the cue to recall the letters in the Sperling experiment was delayed, what would happen to the participants’ recall ability?
It would diminish.
Why did Sperling change the task in his task, where instead, you’d have to just name one row of letters?
If you have to recall all the letters, then it’ll take more time, which will give you more time to forget them.
What was the significance of Sperling’s experiment?
It showed that sensory memory only lasted less than second.
Why do we need sensory memory?
To build a coherent representation of the visual world, like frames of a movie.
How is episodic memory and mental time travel related?
Episodic memory relies on mental time travel so we can recall a memory in detail.
Classical conditioning relates to what type of memory?
Implicit.
Episodic and semantic memory relate to what type of memory?
Explicit.
What is memory?
The process by which we encode, store, and retrieve information.
What does it mean that the hippocampus is bilateral?
There is a hippocampus on both sides of the brain.
Where is the hippocampus?
Deep with the temporal lobe
What type of brain damage leads to amnesia?
Bilateral lesioning.
Where are sounds processed?
First processed in the auditory cortex.
Steps in Atkinson-Sciffrin Model?
- Environment
- Sensory memory
- STM
- LTM
Where long-term memories stored?
Wherever that memory was encoded, not the hippocampus.
Why is it important that the tone sounded AFTER the letters flashed instead of before, in Sperling’s Iconic Memory Experiment?
They didn’t want to cue them before to be ready to remember a certain row.
What was the procedure for Sperling’s Iconic Memory Experiment?
Sounded low, medium, or high tone immediately after matrix disappeared.
What were the results of Sperling’s Iconic Memory Experiment?
Recall of a row was perfect.
What if we were to delay sounding the tone after the letters flashed (instead of playing the tone immediately)?
They wouldn’t remember it that well.
What’s the capacity of sensory memory?
Almost unlimited.
Who was Clive Wearing?
An amnesic patient who would forget what had come right before. But his implicit memory was intact.
What did Clive Wearing probably have?
Bilateral hippocampal lesion + lesioning to areas beyond the MTL / hippocampus.
What part of the brain processes sensory input?
Many different parts of the brain.
Do you think that Clive Wearing had issues with his sensory areas of his brain?
No.
