Memory is the process by which we recollect prior experiences, information and skills learned in the past

Chapter 7

Memory

Types of memory

Episodic Memory

Memory of a specific event

Semantic Memory

General knowledge memory

Implicit Memory

Skills or procedure memory

Name the Seven Dwarves

Take out a piece of paper

Difficulty of Task

• Was the exercise easy or difficult.

It depends on what factors?

•Whether you like Disney movies

•how long ago you watched the movie

•how loud the people are around you when you are trying to remember

Now pick pick out the seven dwarves.

Turn your paper over.

Grouchy Gabby Fearful Sleepy Smiley Jumpy Hopeful Shy Droopy Dopey Sniffy Wishful Puffy Dumpy Sneezy Pop Grumpy Bashful Cheerful Teach Snorty Nifty Happy Doc Wheezy Stubby Poopy

Seven Dwarves

Sleepy, Dopey, Grumpy, Sneezy, Happy, Doc and Bashful

The Memory process

• Encoding

• Storage

• Retrieval

Encoding

• The processing of information into the memory system.

Typing info into a computer Getting a girls name at a party

Types of Encoding• Semantic Encoding: the encoding

of meaning, like the meaning of words

•Acoustic Encoding: the encoding of sound, especially the sounds of words.

•Visual Encoding: the encoding of picture images.

Encoding exercise

Which type works best?

Storage

• The retention of encoded material over time.

Pressing Ctrl S and saving the info.

Trying to remember her name when you leave the party.

Tip-of-tongue phenomenon

• A belief that information is stored in memory however we can not retrieve it

• Example: The name of the actor who played the villain in the last Dark Knight movie who I think is really good looking

Retrieval• The process of getting the information out

of memory storage.

Finding your document and opening it up.

Seeing her the next day and calling her the wrong name (retrieval failure).

Context Dependent memory • It helps to put yourself back

in the same context you experienced (encoded) something.

• If you study on your favorite chair at home, you will probably score higher if you also took the test on the chair.

State dependent memory

• Memory retrieval is better of we are in the same state or mood

• We usually recall experiences that are consistent with our current mood. Emotions, or moods, serve as retrieval cues.

Stress and Memory

• Stress can lead to the release of hormones that have been shown to assist in LTM.

• Similar to the idea of Flashbulb Memory.

Flashbulb Memory

A unique and highly emotional moment may give rise to a clear, strong, and persistent

memory called flashbulb memory. However, this memory is not free from errors.

President Bush being told of 9/11 attack.R

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Types of Memory

• Sensory Memory:

• Short-Term Memory

• Long-Term Memory

Sensory Memory• The immediate, initial recording of sensory

information in the memory system.• Stored just for an instant, and most gets

unprocessed.

Sensory Memories

Iconic0.5 sec. long

Echoic3-4 sec. long

Hepatic< 1 sec. long

The duration of sensory memory varies for the different senses.

Short-Term Memory

• Memory that holds a few items briefly.

• Seven digits (plus of minus two).

• The info will be stored into long-term or forgotten.

How do you store things from short-term to long-term?

RehearsalYou must repeat things over and over to put them into your long-term memory.

Memory Effects

1. Spacing Effect: We retain information better when we rehearse over time.

2. Serial Position Effect: When your recall is better for first and last items on a list, but poor for middle items.

Spacing Effect

• We encode better when we study or practice over time.

• DO NOT CRAM!!!!!

Serial Positioning Effect

• Our tendency to recall best the last and first items in a list.

If we graph an average person remembers presidential list- it would probably look something like this.

PresidentsRecalled

List the U.S. Presidents

Take out a piece of paper and….

The Presidents

Washington Taylor Harrison Eisenhower

J.Adams Fillmore Cleveland Kennedy

Jefferson Pierce McKinley L.Johnson

Madison Buchanan T.Roosevelt Nixon

Monroe Lincoln Taft Ford

JQ Adams A.Johnson Wilson Carter

Jackson Grant Harding Reagan

Van Buren Hayes Coolidge Bush

Harrison Garfield Hoover Clinton

Tyler Arthur FD.Roosevelt Bush Jr.

Polk Cleveland Truman Obama

Chunking

• Organizing items into familiar, manageable units.

• Often it will occur automatically.

Chunk- from Goonies

1-4-9-2-1-7-7-6-1-8-1-2-1-9-4-1

Do these numbers mean anything to you?

1492, 1776, 1812, 1941 how about now?

Interference

Learning some new information may disruptretrieval of other information.

Types of Retrieval FailureProactive Interference

• The disruptive effect of prior learning on the recall of new information.

If you call your new girlfriend your old girlfriend’s name.

Types of Retrieval FailureRetroactive Interference

• The disruptive effect of new learning on the recall of old information.

When you finally remember this years locker combination, you forget last years.

Long-Term Memory

• The relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system.

The Hippocampus• Damage to the

hippocampus disrupts our memory.

• Left = Verbal• Right = Visual and

Locations• The hippocampus is the

like the librarian for the library which is our brain.

Storage Decay

• Even if we encode something well, we can forget it.

• Without rehearsal, we forget thing over time.

• Ebbinghaus’s forgetting curve.

Déja Vu

Déja Vu means “I've experienced this before.” Cues from the current situation may unconsciously trigger retrieval of an

earlier similar experience.

© T

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ights Reserved

Déjà Vu

• That eerie sense that you have experienced something before.

• What is occurring is that the current situation cues past experiences that are very similar to the present one- your mind gets confused.

Is déjà vu really a glitch in the Matrix?

Forgetting

Encoding Failure

• We fail to encode the information.

• It never has a chance to enter our LTM.

Which penny is real?

Recall v. Recognition• With recall- you must retrieve the

information from your memory (fill-in-the blank tests).

• With recognition- you must identify the target from possible targets (multiple-choice tests).

• Which is easier?

Did you do better on the first or second dwarf memory exercise?

Rehearsal

Effortful learning usually requires

rehearsal or conscious

repetition.

Ebbinghaus studied rehearsal by using nonsense syllables: TUV YOF GEK XOZ

Hermann Ebbinghaus(1850-1909)

http://ww

w.isbn3-540-21358-9.de

Rehearsal

The more times the nonsense syllables were practiced on

Day 1,the fewer repetitions

were required to remember them on

Day 2.

Motivated Forgetting

Motivated Forgetting: People unknowingly revise their memories.

Repression: A defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness.

Sigmund Freud

Culver Pictures

Motivated Forgetting

One explanation is REPRESSION:

• in psychoanalytic theory, the basic defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings and memories from consciousness.

Why does is exist?

No New Memories

Anterograde Amnesia

AnterogradeAmnesia

(HM)

Surgery

After losing his hippocampus in surgery, patient Henry M. (HM) remembered

everything before the operation but cannot make new memories. We call this

anterograde amnesia.

Memory Intact

Tricks to improve your memory

• Use imagery: mental picturesMnemonic Devices use imagery. Like my “peg word” system or….

Links to examples of mnemonic devices.

"Mary Very Easily Makes Jam Saturday Unless No Plums."

Mars, Venus, Earth, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto.

Give me some more examples….

Self-Reference Effect

• An example of how we encode meaning very well.

• The idea that we remember things (like adjectives) when they are used to describe ourselves.

Peg-word system

Mnemonics

Imagery is at the heart of many memory aids. Mnemonic techniques use vivid

imagery in aiding memory.

Method of Loci

List of Items

CharcoalPensBed SheetsHammer...Rug

Imagined Locations

BackyardStudyBedroomGarage...Living Room

Chunking

Acronyms are another way of chunking information to remember it.

HOMES = Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior

PEMDAS = Parentheses, Exponent, Multiply, Divide, Add, Subtract

ROY G. BIV = Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet

Improving Memory

1. Study repeatedly to boost long-term recall.

2. Spend more time rehearsing or actively thinking about the material.

3. Make material personally meaningful.4. Use mnemonic devices:

associate with peg words — something already stored

make up a story chunk — acronyms

Improving Memory

5. Activate retrieval cues — mentally recreate the situation and mood.

6. Recall events while they are fresh — before you encounter misinformation.

7. Minimize interference:1. Test your own knowledge.2. Rehearse and then determine what you

do not yet know. © L

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-Dann T

ardiff/ Corbis