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Memory
Memory Confabulation
• Seinfeld 1
• Seinfeld 2
• Seinfeld 3
Reconstructing the Past
• Memory- The capacity to retain and retrieve
information, as well as the structures that account for
this capacity
• How does our memory work?
– Memory is selective, we do not remember everything we
experience
– Memory is not like watching a movie, it is like taking split
frames and piecing them together
• Frederic Bartlett (1932)-Memory a reconstructive process
– We alter complex information to help us make sense of material
• When recollecting an event we often times incorporate multiple
basic concepts from various sources and construct them into our
interpretation of what happened
– Our inability to distinguish what was added to the story from what
actually happened is often referred to as source amnesia.
– Damage to Hippocampus can lead to inability to form lasting memories
(Memento)
The Fading Flashbulb
• Some memories of unusual, shocking, or
tragic events hold a special place in memory if
we ar personally involved
– Coined as flashbulb memories by Brown and Kulik
(1977)
– Memories often grow dimmer with time
• Does not matter whether flashbulb memories are of
positive or negative events
• Proves that reconstructing occurs over time even with
such emotional events.
Conditions of Confabulation
• Memory is subject to bias
• We often times remember info that supports a
choice and dump info that would have led us to
an alternative
• Often occurs under 4 circumstances:
– You have thought about the imagined event many
times
– The image of the event contains a lot of details
– The event is easy to imagine
– You focus on your emotional reactions to the event
rather than on what actually happened
Memory and the Power of Suggestion
• Due to reconstruction memory is very open to
suggestion
• 3 areas where suggestion has a strong
influence on memory are:
– Eyewitness Testimony
– Children’s Testimony
– Hypnotic Recall of Events
Eyewitness Testimony
• 90 percent of 40 cases where DNA evidence overturned a
conviction had convictions established on eyewitness testimony
(Wells et al., 1998)
• Roughly 4,500 people go to prison on wrongful prosecutions due to
eyewitness testimony a year
• Much of this has to do with the way in which questions are asked or
comments are made during an interrogation or interview
– Loftus and Palmer demonstrated this in their 1974 study depicting car
collisions
– Further demonstrated in 1976 study by Loftus and Zanni asking
witness if they saw “ a” or “the” broken headlight
• Studies have also shown that we can be asked to recall events that
have never actually happened to us at all.
– The Bunny Effect
Children’s Testimony
• Ceci and Bruck (1995)
– Asked: Under what conditions are children apt to be suggestible?
– Gets away from dealing in absolutes
– Preschoolers more vulnerable to suggestive questions then school
aged children
– Also more likely to have source amnesia
– Boundary between fantasy and reality may blur for young children
– Children often conform to interviewer’s expectations and look to
please interviewer
– Garven et al. (1998) looked at techniques used in McMartin PreSchool Case and found that they greatly increased false allegations
from 15% to 80% (Big statement: Other Kids said this happened)
– In 2000 Garven, Wood, and Malpass did a similar study using positive
reinforcers to reporting false allegations and found the allegations
increased to 52% from 5 % for the control group.
Memory Under Hypnosis
• Hypnosis is not a trancelike state in which the subject has no
control over their behavior or feelings
• Instead it is a procedure in which a practitioner suggests changes in
sensations, perceptions, thoughts, feelings, or behavior of the
subject , who cooperates by altering their cognitive functioning
accordingly
• Does not increase the accuracy of memory
• Instead increases natural tendency to confuse fact and speculation
because of a desire to please the hypnotist and the hypnotists
encouragement of fantasy and detailed images
• Can increase recall, but also increases errors
• Spanos et al. (1991) proved the errors that come with hypnosis by
asking for specifics
Measuring Memory
• Explicit Memory-conscious recollection of an event or
an item of information
• Can be tested in two ways:
– Recall-retrieve and reproduce information
• Essay, Fill in Blank, Memory Games
– Recognition-identify information
• Multiple Choice, True False
• Recognition is stronger than recall particularly with
visual images
– Bahrick, Bahrick, and Whitaker (1975) demonstrated this
with former classmates
–
• Implicit memory-unconscious retention in
memory, as evidenced by the effect of previous
experience or previously encountered
information on current thoughts or actions
– Priming- a method for measuring implicit memory in
which a person reads or listens to information and is
later tested to see whether the information effects
performance on another type of task.
– Relearning memory- a method of measuring retention
that compares the time required to relearn material
with the time used in the initial learning of material
Models for Memory
• Usually takes the form of an information processing model
– 3 interacting memory systems used
• Sensory Memory-Takes memory form senses and holds it for a second or two
• Short Term Memory-Holds a limited amount of information for a brief period
of time
• Long-Term Memory-Accounts for the long term storage of information
• Called 3 box model and has dominated research memory since
1960’s
– Criticisms• Some believe only 1 system exists with different mental processes for different
tasks
• Brain does not operate like average computer (non-sequential)
• These people tend to favor a parallel distributive processing model
(connectionist)
– Processes take place among a vast network of interacting processing units
The 3 Box Model of Memory
Sensory
Memory
• Large Capacity
• Contains
Sensory info
• Very brief
retention
• ½ Sec Visual
• 2 Sec Audio
STM
• Limited
Capacity
• Brief Storage
(30 Seconds)
• Involved in
Conscious
Processing of
Info
LTM
• Unlimited
Capacity
• May be
permanent
• Info organized
and indexed
Process
• Info taken via sensory is either forgotten or transferred to STM
– Pattern Recognition takes place here
• Process of identifying stimulus based on info contained in LTM
• STM either forgets this info or transfers it to LTM
– Many believe at this phase info is converted into some encoding form (word
or phrase)
– Considered Working Memory
– Can hold limited number of items (Most accepted number is George Miller’s 7
+/- 2)
– We combat the limitation of retention in Short Term by chunking info
• In LTM info is stored and can be returned to STM
– Information is highly organized
•
•
•
•
•
Network models-like inspiration organizers
Visual and auditory groupings of words
Familiarity
Relevance
Association with other info
Contents of Long Term Memory
• Procedural Memories- knowing how to do
something
– Implicit- not much conscious processing required
• Declarative Memories-knowing something is
true
– Explicit-conscious processing required
– 2 classes
• Semantic Memories-internal representations of the
world, independent of any context
– Include facts, rules and concepts
• Episodic Memories-internal representations of
personally experienced events
Serial-Position Effect
• When given a list to remember we often
remember the first items on the list as well as
the last items
– Due to Primacy effect and Recency Effect
• Primacy-Items committed to LTM
• Recency-Items still in STM
How We Remember
• Effective Encoding-sensory info summarized and encoded
– 2 types
• Automatic Encoding-location in space and time
• Effortful Encoding-requires selection of main points, labeling concepts,
making personal associations for info
• Rehearsal- Keeping info in STM by review in hopes of
transferring to LTM
– Most often done verbally, which leads to confusing items that
sound similar
– 2 types
• Maintenance-rote repetition
• Elaborative-associating info with material already stored in LTM
– Deep processing-processing the meaning rather than the
physical or sensory features of a stimulus
• Mnemonics
– Formal strategies and tricks for encoding, storing
and retaining information
• MCEG (Methods, Culture, Ethics, Gender)
– Best ones force you to encode material actively
and thoroughly
– Best also reduce via chunking
Why We Forget
• Required for our survival and sanity
• 5 mechanisms account for forgetting:
– Decay-memory traces fade with time if they are not accessed
every now and then
– Replacement-new information entering memory can replace old
information
– Interference-similar items of information interfere with one
another in storage or retrieval
• 2 types
– Retroactive-new info interferes with ability to remember old info
– Proactive-old info interferes with ability to remember new info
– Cue-dependent Forgetting-inability to retrieve info because of
insufficient cues for recall
• State-dependent memory can act as a retrieval cue if we are in the
same physical or mental state
– Psychogenic Amnesia-partial or complete loss of info of
traumatic experience
• Repression not believed to be the likely culprit
Autobiographical Memories
• Memories we have of ourselves
• Childhood Amnesia-inability to remember events and experiences
from first 2-3 years of life
• We do maintain procedural memories
• Children have difficulty carrying their episodic memories even
though in early childhood they can remember events from early
stages
• May have to do with development of prefrontal cortex
• Other possibilities being explored:
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Lack of a sense of self
Impoverished encoding
Focus on the routine
Different ways of thinking about the world
Memory and Narratives
• The words we use to convey emotions about an event
may lead to us “spinning” the story
– Can change our perception of people later down the line
• The elderly experience a thing called the reminiscence
bump which causes them to recollect on adolescence
and early adulthood more than midlife. (Events may
be perceived as more significant: milestones, etc.)
• Much of what we remember is distorted in some way,
so we our always rewriting the past as we recollect on
it
Memories and Myths
• Intense suggestions and therapies such as
hypnosis can cause false memories
• Best evidence for recovered memory exists
when in occurred spontaneously, elicited an
emotional response, and medical records can
corroborate the evidence.