INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY

1
INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY

• Chapter 7
• Memory

2
At the end of this Chapter you should be able to

• Understand what memory is
• Learn about working memory and long term memory
• Learn about three aspects of memory acquisition,
  storage and retrieval
• Understand what happens when memory fails

3
Memory

• Without memory....
• No recollection of events
• No knowledge
• No reflection of past events no giving advice to
  others
• No basis for self-esteem and mood
• No idea about past achivements

4
Acquisition, Storage, Retrieval

• Any act of memory requires success at three
  aspects
• Input, or the acquisition of knowledge -
  Acquisiton
• Creation of a memory trace, or the storage of
  knowledge - Storage
• Ability to use the knowledge - Retrieval
• Recall / Recognition

5
Acquisition

• Includes any instance of new intentional (like
  memorizing) or incidental learning
• Incidental What did you have for dinner
  yesterday? You didnt memorize, but you know
• Attention and engagement with to-be-remembered
  material is crucial acquisition is not passive
  or camera-like

6
(No Transcript)
7
The Stage Theory of Memory

• Different types of memory, each with different
  properties
• Working memory (Short-term)
• Instantly accessible information
• Long-term memory
• Less instantly accessible

8
Working Memory / Long Term Memory

• When we are actively working, we want information
  to be immediately available to us. In our brain,
  this happens in Working (short-term) Memory.
• Long Term Memory is for extra information. It
  contains everything you know. It is storage for
  information that is not used right now but may be
  needed later.

9
Storage Capacity of Working and Long-term memory

• Long-term memory capacity huge
• Working memory capacity more modest
• Memory span way of measuring working memory
  capacity
• Random, unrelated information we can store
  about 7, plus or minus 2, items (5 9 items)
• Referred to as the magic number 7

10
Working Memory

• Loading platform analogy
• Long term memory must be loaded or pass
  through WM
• How does it move? How is it transformed into Long
  term memory?
• Rehearsed
• Chunked
• Primacy Effect
• Recency Effect

11
Chunking

• Working memory can only handle a small number of
  items at one time. However what these packages
  contain can be up to us.
• 149162536496481
• Can you remember all of these digits?

12
Chunking

• If you look at these digits independently, you
  will fail to remember them!
• What about if you organize them differently?
• 1 4 9 16 25 36 49 64 81
• Now you only have to remember the relationship
  between these items. So working memorys capacity
  is dependent on these chunks, not independent
  items.

13
Active memory and organizationA changed emphasis

• Learners activities must be considered when
  examining memory
• Maintenance rehearsal
• Primacy / Recency Effect
• Processing and organizing information the
  Royal Road into Memory
• Do you know whose picture is on 5 TL?

14

• Athough people see 5 TL many many times, they
  seem to have little recollection of its layout
• Adnan Sayili

15
Depth of processing

• Deep processing
• Meaning-based attention
• Anything that connects new information to
  already-learned material
• Material that makes sense will be encoded more
  efficiently
• Results in superior recall

16
Depth of processing

• Memory connections
• Links among ideas
• Abstract similarities
• When the time comes to recall something, these
  connections, established during initial learning
  or acquisition, can be used as retrieval paths.
• Mnemonics
• Method of loci
• Based on rhythm/rhyme/melody/visualization

17
A
B

• Research participants shown related elements,
  such as a doll sitting on a chair and waving flag
  (A), are more likely to associate the words doll,
  flag and chair than participants who are shown
  the three objects next to each other but not
  interacting (B).

18
Storage

• Once encoded, must be stored until needed
• Record (stored memory) memory trace or the
  engram
• Storage process difficult to research But a
  memory is NOT stored in a single location
  different aspects of a memory can be stored in
  different brain structures

19
Consolidation

• Memory traces are not created instantly. A period
  of time is needed after the experience to become
  established in memory. This makes memories
  permanent. (You need to sleep in order for this
  to take place!!!!)
• Evidence for consolidation?
• Retrograde amnesia a blow to the head can
  interrupt the process of consolidation for events
  that happened 1-2 hours before the accident
  occurred
• Memory for events during that time period is lost

20
Retrieval

• Storage is not enough we must be able to access
  the memory when needed
• Inadequate coding ? failure to retrieve
• With an adequate retrieval cue, sometimes we
  realize that encoding wasnt the problem after
  all. Like, if you see the persons face, youll
  remember their name. A word or a smell may help
  you remember. These are all cues (hints).

21
Retrieval cues

• Context reinstatement
• Re-creating or re-minding oneself of the context
  in which one originally learned something
  increases likelihood of being able to retrieve it
  later
• Example Studying for an exam in the same room
  you will take the test returning to your
  hometown and remembering things you had
  forgotten

22
Memory failures

• Inadequate encoding Forgetting can often be
  traced to poor or missing strategies for encoding
• Forgetting we knew it once, but no longer
• Passage of time
• Can be graphed with a forgetting curve the
  opposite of a learning curve
• Ebbinghaus Memory declines with time, more
  sharply at first, then more gradually

23
(No Transcript)
24
Memory failures

• Decay a process that occurs on a cellular level
  by normal metabolic wear and tear on cells
  involved with memory
• Interference New learning interferes
  independent of the passage of time
• Passage of time not a powerful factor in
  explaining forgetting
• Number of intervening events are more useful
  variable to examine to explain forgetting

25
Other retrieval errors

• Retrieval failure
• One type the tip of the tongue phenomena
• Who was the famous American basketball player who
  wore 23 as a uniform number?
• Who was the man who played in the movie Psycho,
  with a knife in his hand in the shower scene?

26
Misinformation Effect

• Imagine you eye witnessed a crime and see the
  thief flee in a blue car. The next day, you read
  a newspaper account of the same crime and learn
  that another witness reported that the thief fled
  in a green car.
• How will this new information influence your
  memory?
• The errors we make can be very large. People can
  be led to remember cars that were not actually
  present in an event, and whole buildings that do
  not exist. They can even recall events that never
  happened.

27
Misinformation Effect

• It is common to remember things that never
  happened.
• Example of this is experiment by Wade, Garry,
  Read, Lindsay (2002)
• People were shown photographs of themselves in a
  hot-air balloon and asked what they remembered.
  Most people remembered the experience. But the
  photos were made using photoshop. The people had
  never been in a hot-air balloon

28
Misinformation Effect

• Misinformation can be used to insert new ideas
  into memory. In these cases the original memory
  may even be lost because the person who is given
  the misinformation (new information about an
  event that happened) overwrites the original
  memory with the fake one.

29
More (!) retrieval errors

• Intrusions from general knowledge
• Misplaced familiarity
• Difference between recollection memory and
  familiarity
• Big problem for us No reliable way to tell
  good memories (accurate) from bad memories
  (those that are false or contain misinformation
  or inaccuracy)

30
Techniques for improving memory

• How to help us create better memories?
• Techniques for improving eyewitness
  identifications that are more reliable
• Re-create mind-set
• Minimize distractions/distractors
• Unhelpful techniques
• Hypnosis

31
Amnesia Memory Loss

• Different brain tissue supports implicit memories
  as compared to explicit memories
• Evident when studying anterograde amnesia
• Lesions in hippocampus and temporal cortex
  create anterograde amnesia
• Lesions from other types of brain injury create
  retrograde amnesia
• Supports the theory that different brain
  structures/regions handle different types of
  memory

32
Retrograde amnesia

• Forgetting the past, but being able to make new
  memories. Soldiers are sometimes unable to
  remember their experiences in battle-even the
  ones that occured a day before.

33
Anterograde Amnesia

• Anterograde means in a forward direction. May
  be caused by a stroke or a physical trauma.
• It is essentially an inability to learn anything
  new/make new memories.

34
Anterograde Amnesia

• Famous case Patient H.M.
• He could read and write. His long-term storage is
  completely closed to new memories. His memories
  before the operation remain intact. He can
  function and comment intellectually on events.

35
Anterograde Amnesia

• What is wrong with H.M.?
• He had an uncle that he really loved. His uncle
  passes away and then he is told about the death
  of his uncle. He was deeply distressed when told
  about this, but the he forgot! Some time later he
  would ask where his uncle was, and was again told
  about his death. His sadness and grief was just
  as intense as before each time he hears this sad
  news. He said he is hearing it for the first
  time-with all the shock and grief.

36
Anterograde Amnesia

• It turns out these anterograde amnesia patients
  can acquire some new memories. For example H.M.
  plays the piano and each time he plays a piece,
  he plays it more skillfully.
• Distinction between different types of knowledge
  memory for skill, memory for general knowledge,
  memory for episodes.
• KNOWING HOW vs. KNOWING WHAT

37
(No Transcript)
38
Emotional Remembering

• Does memory for emotional events differ in any
  systematic way?
• Emotional events remembered
• More vividly
• More completely
• More accurately
• than memories for emotion-neutral events

39
Flashbulb memories

• Especially vivid memories
• Focus immediate and personal details
• Special mechanism to produce this type of memory?
  
• No evidence that these types of memories are in
  a special class with respect to immunity from
  error or extreme longevity

40
Flashbulb memories

• They are likely to involve people we love and
  care about.
• Some emotional memories are particularly
  long-lived, so that people claim to remember
  events from years and years ago as if it were
  yesterday.

41
Flashbulb memories

• Flashbulb memories are highly special events,
  usually unexpected and emotionally strong. Such
  as 9/11 terrorist attacks to the World Trade
  Center, or Princess Dianas death.
• Where and who were you with when you first heard
  these events? Most people remember all the
  details