Download Unit 7A: Cognition

Document related concepts

Mind-wandering wikipedia , lookup

Holonomic brain theory wikipedia , lookup

Transcript
UNIT 7A: COGNITION
Memory
MEMORY TEST
Quick! What is the last thing you can remember? AKA What is your most recent memory?
Discuss
Now try this…. What is the very first memory you can think of? AKA What is your oldest
memory? Discuss
Which was harder to remember? Why?
Memory accounts for time and defines our life.
It is our memory that allows us to recognize our family, speak our language, find out
way home and locate food and water. Hello! Survival!
Our memory allows us to enjoy an experience and then replay it over and over
again. What is your happiest memory? Usually one of the easiest to remember. On
the other hand, it also prevents us from forgetting some of our worst experiences.
What is your saddest memory? Usually one of the easiest to remember.
Memory allows us to learn new skills, retain those skills and even recognize our own
selves.
Memory  the persistence of learning over time through the storage and
retrieval of information.
Extremes of Memory – severe loss from stroke, Alzheimer's, aging, etc
On the other hand there are lots of extreme memory retention people. These
people are able to retain 100s of random letters or numbers when only
hearing them once. Recite forwards and backwards.
World Memory Championships 2014
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHKov8ZTTig
INFORMATION PROCESSING
So how can you remember how memory works? (Ha! See what I did there… ))
Think of memory of how a computer stores information.
A computer must 1) input information, 2) retain that information and later be able to 3)
retrieve it. Our brains work in the same 3 steps:
1) Encoding  the processing of information into the memory systems – for example,
by extracting meaning
2) Storage  the retention of encoded information over time.
3) Retrieval  the process of getting information out of memory storage.
Called the Atkinson-Shiffrin Three-Stage Model
Our memory is a lot less literal and a lot less fragile than how a computer works.
Brains are actually slower than computers, as computers can process way more tasks
at a time than your brain can. We can still process many tasks over time, just not as
many as a computer.
The modern model for how we remember is called Connectionism and is explained in
3 stages:
1) We first record to be remembered information as a fleeting sensory memory 
the immediate, very brief recording of sensory information in the memory
system.
2) From here, we process information into a short term memory  activated
memory that holds a few items briefly, such as the seven digits of a phone
number while dialing before the information is stored or forgotten. This is
your short term memory bin, where we encode through rehearsal.
3) Finally, information moves into long term memory for later retrieval. Long
term memory  the relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the
memory system. Includes knowledge, skills, and experiences.
30 SECOND MEMORY
Most psychologists now use a modified model of the 3 step process.
This new model incoroporates 2 new ideas about memory:
1) Some memories can skip the first 2 stages of the 3 step model and go directly into
long term memory. This is without conscious thought.
2) Working memory  a newer understanding of short-term memory that
focuses on conscious, active processing of incoming auditory and visualspatial information, and of information retrieved from long-term memory.
We cannot possibly focus on all the information bombarding our senses at once, we
only focus on attention on certain incoming stimuli, those that are novel and important.
This is mixed along with long term memory in our temporary working memory.
Working memory helps us to associate new and old information and solves problems.
Modified Three-stage Processing
Model of Memory
MODELS OF MEMORY
Don’t confuse short term memory with a belief that things that
they remember for days or week and then forget are only
stored in STM. True STM only lasts about a minute or so.
Memories that stay with us for longer, but not permanently, are
stored in working memory.
ENCODING:
GETTING
INFORMATION IN
Encoding
Effortful
Automatic
ENCODING: GETTING INFORMATION IN
Depending on what you are trying to remember, your brain will have to work harder.
Walking down the hall to your next class. No so hard. Trying to memorize your friends
new cell phone number… a little harder.
Our brain engages in parallel processing  the processing of many aspects of a
problem simultaneously; the brain’s natural mode of information processing
for many functions. Contrasts with the step-by-step (serial) processing of
most computers and of conscious problem solving.
Due to the fact that our brain can process a few things at a time, an enormous amount
of multi-tasking goes on without your conscious attention. For example, without
conscious effort you automatically process ( unconscious encoding of incidental
information, such as space, time and frequency, and of well-learned
information, such as word meanings.) information about things such as space,
time and frequency.
This applies to how how you understand words and reading. First you had to sound
out letters indivudally. Once you have seen a word often you re able to read it from
sight. Once you identified more and more words, you were able to read faster and
faster.
Try it here!
.citamotua emoceb nac gnissecorp luftroffE
EFFORTFUL PROCESSING
We encode and retain vast amount of information automatically, but we remember different
types of information, such as the concepts from one of psychology units, only with effort and
attention.
Effortful processing  encoding that requires attention and conscious effort.
So how can you boost your retention ability?
Rehearsal  the conscious repetition of information, either to maintain it in
consciousness or to encode it for storage.
Also called conscious repetition.
Idea from Hermann Ebbinghaus. Memorization techniques. The amount
remembered depends on the amount of time spent learning. Over learning from
additional rehearsal helps too. Rehearse material even after you think you know it.
Those who learn quickly, also forget quickly… Kinda goes against AP ideas eh?
We retain information better over rehearsal over time.
Rehearsal  the conscious repetition of information, either to maintain it in
consciousness or to encode it for storage.
Spacing Effect  the tendency for distributed study or practice to yield better
long-term retention than is achieved through massed study or practice.
Cramming (massed practice) can give you the idea that you know the
information, but you will lose it almost immediately. Long term and repetitious
studying will help you to actually know it (distributed practice). So you can
cram for your psychology test, but when that information comes up again on
your final… you’re screwed.
TIMING
Timing plays a role in what you will remember and how well you will remember it. Imagine that you
rehearsed the information that you had to learn every night for weeks before the big exam. You
had to learn lists of items for this exam. You can remember the first things on the list and the last
things on the list – but you are having trouble remembering the middle items. This is because the
position of an item on a list influences our memory of that item. This is called the serial position
effect  our tendency to recall best the last and first items in a list.
. It is our tendency to remember the first and last items in a list.
When you remember the items near the beginning, it is called the primacy effect.
When you remember the items at the end, it is called the recency effect. When you are rehearsing
lists, you have to spend extra time on the middle items.
Next time you go to the grocery store without a list, see which items you remember to purchase and
which items you forget. Also, see what happens the next time you are introduced to ten new
people at the same time. Which names do you remember and which names do you forget?
Primacy – primary –first
Recency – recent - last
Serial Position Effect
Put your notes away!
Pull out a piece of blank paper.
Pencils down!
In class show the next slide, the one with the ‘+’ on it. Tell students that the cross will
be replaced with a series of words. Their task is to remember as many of the words
as possible. Order is not important. When the blank slide appears at the end, give
students a few minutes to write down the words. Now show the last slide.
+
CHICKEN
BUILD
FINGER
LISTEN
ZIPPER
THUNDER
WORDS
KNIFE
FENCE
DINNER
ADAPT
ROAD
DETEST
PHONE
Did you remember ______?
A. Yes
B. No
CHICKEN
KNIFE
BUILD
FENCE
FINGER
DINNER
LISTEN
ADAPT
ZIPPER
ROAD
THUNDER
DETEST
WORDS
PHONE
ROUND 2!
Half the class on the left, half on the right.
Let’s see what side is better at this!!!!
VON RESTORFF EFFECT
Related to the serial position effect
Occurs when information in a list is unique or strange in some way
Their unique status makes them easier to remember.
ENCODING: GETTING
INFORMATION IN
WHAT WE ENCODE
Levels of Processing
Visual encoding  the encoding of picture images.
Acoustic encoding  the encoding of sound, especially the
sound of words.
Semantic encoding  the encoding of meaning, including
the meaning of words.
Self-reference effect
Processing information is kind of like sorting through the mail, the email, and text
messages that we get every day. Some of it is junk mail, some of it we need to read
and remember for a short period of time and other information we need to retain for
a longer period of time. To help us do this, we need to encode meaning and images,
use memory tricks or techniques called mnemonic devices, and organize the
information for later storage and retrieval.
Encoding Meaning
You need to make what you want to remember meaningful. This is the process of
semantic encoding. Research has shown that if you encode information according to
meaning, rather than encoding visually or acoustically, you remember the information
more effectively.
A good way to add meaning to material is to use the self-reference effect. This
means that you relate the information to your own life making it personally relevant.
The material in this course should be easy to learn and remember because it is all
about behaviour and mental processes as they relate to you.
SEMANTIC ENCODING ACTIVITY!
I will be handing out 2 different diagrams, one on blue paper, one on pink. When I
say go, flip over you paper. Whatever you see, is what you see. I will then read a
passage of a story.
Once you have heard the story, write down on a separate sheet of paper
what you remember from the story.
We will then compare who remembered the story better!
Discuss the results… what happened and why?
Encoding: Getting Information In
What We Encode
VISUAL ENCODING
Visual encoding helps us to understand why we struggle to remember things such as
formulas, definitions and dates, but can easily remember where we were yesterday,
who we were with, what we wore, etc.
This is because we tend to remember better in visual pictures.
Our earliest memories involve imagery  mental pictures; a powerful aid to
effortful processing, especially when combined with semantic encoding.
We tend to recall more of the high points, rather than the mundane. This is called rosy
retrospection is when the negative emotion recalled from bad events fades more
rapidly than the positive emotion recalled from good events.
Ex) You don’t remember the long lines and hot weather at Disney world… you
remember the overall good experience.
Imagery also is the way that allow mnemonic (Greek word for memory) devices to work for
memory.
Mnemonic  memory aids, especially those techniques that use vivid imagery and
organizational devices.
Mnemonics also work well for the peg word system. You assign a word to a number.
One is bun
Two is a shoe
Three is a tree
Four is a door
Five is a hive
Six is sticks
Seven is heaven
Eight is a gate
Nine is a swine
Ten is a hen
Now just try to remember the words… not the numbers. We will try this in a second.
MNEMONICS
Loci. For this technique, mentally walk around an area familiar
to you, placing items as you go. The more visually vivid the
placement, the greater the likelihood of recall. For example,
there is a giant eggplant in my driveway, mushrooms along the
sidewalk (perhaps even with a garden gnome under one of
them), a live chicken on the stoop, broccoli hanging on the front
door. Once you enter your place, move around to the right or
the left so you can easily follow the same path during recall.
Cereal on the chair, eggs smashed on the window, pizza draped
over the TV, and so on.
After providing this example, ask students to try this technique in
a place familiar to them. Give them 2 to 2.5 minutes. The next
click will bring up a blank slide. Give them a few minutes to
write down the words they remembered. The next click shows
the list and the clicker question asking how many words they
recalled.
Shampoo
Eggplant
Hamburger
Mushrooms
Carrots
Chicken
Cheese
Broccoli
Apples
Cereal
Diapers
Eggs
Dogfood
Pizza
Potato Chips
Soda pop
Eggplant
Shampoo
How many did you remember?
Mushrooms
Hamburger
A. 16
Chicken
Carrots
B. 15
Broccoli
Cheese
Cheerios
Apples
Eggs
Diapers
Pizza
Dogfood
Dr. Pepper
Potato Chips
C. 14
D. 13
E. Less than 13
Linking. In this technique the items are linked together in a story. For example, two beer bottles
are walking down the street wearing tortilla capes and tossing a grapefruit ball back and forth. A
couple cauliflowers carrying a bouquet of french fries comes up to them asking if they’d like to
take swim in the nearby orange juice lake. They float out on the lake in donut inner tubes.
Visual imagery is key. Remind students to picture the story as it unfolds.
After providing this example, ask students to try this technique either taking off from your story left
off or starting their own story. Give them 2 to 2.5 minutes. The next click will bring up a blank
slide. Give them a few minutes to write down the words they remembered. The next click shows
the list and the clicker question asking how many words they recalled.
Beer
Baked Beans
Tortillas
Peas
Grapefruit
Batteries
Cauliflower
Yogurt
French Fries
Bagels
Orange Juice
Cinnamon
Donuts
Ice Cream
Porkchops
Toothpaste
Beer
Baked Beans
How many did you remember?
Tortillas
Peas
A. 16
Grapefruit
Batteries
B. 15
Cauliflower
Yogurt
French Fries
Bagels
Orange Juice
Cinnamon
Donuts
Ice Cream
Porkchops
Toothpaste
C. 14
D. 13
E. Less than 13
Pegwords. In this technique students must first memorize the
rhyme. Each number has a rhyming image associated with it,
e.g., one bun, two shoe. The image (bun, shoe,…) is the
‘pegword’ that the word to be remembered hangs on.
1-bun, picture a bun soaking in a bowl of milk.
2-shoe, picture jelly squished into a shoe.
3-tree, picture hotdogs hanging on a tree.
4-door, picture a door handle as a stalk of celery.
5-hive, picture bees trying to squish a watermelon into their hive.
Walk students through all 10 items, then advance to the blank
slide and ask students to write down this list in order. Advancing
the slide again shows the pegwords and the associated grocery
list.
1 – Bun
2 – Shoe
3 – Tree
4 – Door
5 – Hive
6 – Sticks
7 – Heaven
8 – Gate
9 – Wine
10 – Hen
Milk
Jelly
Hotdogs
Celery
Watermelon
Apples
Tea
Oatmeal
Lettuce
Macaroni
1 – Bun
2 – Shoe
3 – Tree
4 – Door
5 – Hive
6 – Sticks
7 – Heaven
8 – Gate
9 – Wine
10 – Hen
Milk
Jelly
Hotdogs
Celery
Watermelon
Apples
Tea
Oatmeal
Lettuce
Macaroni
How many did you remember?
A. 10
B. 9
C. 8
D. 7
E. Less than 7
Kingdom
1 – Bun
Phylum
2 – Shoe
Class
3 – Tree
Order
4 – Door
Family
5 – Hive
6 – Sticks
Genus
7 – Heaven
Species
8 – Gate
9 – Wine
10 – Hen Because of interference (and the lack of a need to remember it
in order) a grocery list is probably not a good candidate for
pegwords. Here is the classification system in biology.
1 – Bun
2 – Shoe
3 – Tree
4 – Door
5 – Hive
6 – Sticks
7 – Heaven
8 – Gate
9 – Wine
10 – Hen
Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Here are the planets, starting with the one closest to the sun.
Which mnemonic technique did you like the best?
A. Loci
B. Linking
C. Pegwords
Another way Mnemonic devices are used are with chunking  organizing items into
familiar, manageable units; often occurs automatically.
Chunking works the best when the reader can organize the information into
meaningful arrangements.
Chunking tends to work better with Acronyms
You make an acronym by taking the first letter of the words that you need to
remember. For example, to remember the names of the Great Lakes, use the
acronym HOMES – Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior. To remember the
colours of the visual spectrum use Roy G Biv. You can make up your acronyms for any
information.
COMPARE THE ROWS, WHICH IS EASIER TO
REMEMBER? WHY?
SUB SET OF CHUNKING : SUBSTITUTION
TECHNIQUE
Letters are used to replace numbers
For example a T may be substituted
for the number 1; N for 2, M for 3
etc.
The letters may then be used to
makeup words or sentences.
Example is when remembering
phone numbers.
What word(s) is/are your phone
number?
HIERARCHIES
When people develop expertise in an area, they process information, not only in
chunks, but in hierarchies composed of a few broad concepts divided and subdivided
into narrower concepts and facts.
Think of a word web!
MNEMONIC WIZARDS
STORAGE: RETAINING INFORMATION
The heart of memory is STORAGE.
Memories must be stored and retrieved to be remembered.
Sperling Memory Experiment
Sperling flashed a group of letters for one-twentieth of a sec, and people could only
recall half of the letters. But when signaled to recall a particular row immediatly
after the letters had disappeared, they could do so.
SENSORY MEMORY
Two Types:
Iconic Memory  a momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli; a photographic or
picture-image memory lasting no more than a few tenths of a second.
Sperling’s test revealed that we have a fleeting photographic memory. Our visual
screen clears quickly, as new images are superimposed over old ones.
Echoic Memory  a momentary sensory memory of auditory stimuli; if attention is
elsewhere, sounds and words can still be recalled within 3 or 4 seconds.
Auditory echos tend to linger for 3-4 seconds. Ex) Teacher test!
SHORT-TERM MEMORY
From our sensory memory some information is encoded into short-term memory. This
is more permanent than sensory memory. It contains information that you are
consciously aware of.
Short-term memory is also called working memory. Everything you are thinking at
the current moment is held in your short-term memory. Short-term memories are
temporary. If you do nothing with them they will fade in 10-30 seconds.
There are limitations to how much information we can store in short-term memory. It
seems that seven plus or minus two chunks of information can be stored at a given
time. The information will not fade as long as you rehearse it.
STORAGE: RETAINING
INFORMATION
WORKING/SHORT-TERM MEMORY
Magic number Seven
Plus or minus 2
The list of magic sevens







Seven wonders of world
Seven seas
Seven deadly sins
Seven primary colors
Seven musical scale notes
Seven days of the week
Seven numbers in a phone number
LONG-TERM MEMORY
Long-term memory is our relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the
memory system. It stores memories without conscious effort. No one knows how long
memories can be stored for. Long-term memories can be stored in three different
formats:
Episodic memory – This is memory of specific events stored as a sequence.
Semantic memory – This is memory of general knowledge, stored as fact, meanings
or categories.
Procedural memory – This memory of skills and how to perform them, stored as a
sequence.
FUN FACT: Clark’s Nutcracker Bird can remember over 6000 caches of seeds it had
previously buried.
STORAGE: RETAINING
INFORMATION
LONG-TERM MEMORY
Unlimited nature of long-term memory
EIDETIC MEMORY
STORING MEMORIES IN THE BRAIN
“ Our memories are flexible and superimposable, a panoramic blackboard with an
endless supply of chalk and erasers.” – Elizabeth Loftus and Katherine Ketcham.
We know now that memories do not reside in single specific parts of our brain. (Rat in
maze, parts of brain cut out, can remember how to get out).
So in order to find these memories, we use the memory trace – or our desire to
understand the physical basis of memory.
We can see this through synaptic changes… physically more neuron receptor sites will
grow between neurons as a memory is formed. Ex. Apysia sea slug… 20,000 nerve
cells… can see when new ones grow
Researchers have searched for years for the “memory trace.” LTP (Long-term
potentiation  an increase in a synapse’s firing potential after brief, rapid
stimulation. Believed to be a neural basis for learning and memory) may be
the closest thing .
It seems on a neuronal level, practice matters.
The more we use a particular neuronal chain, the stronger the behavior associated
with that chain becomes.
Memory boosting drugs
CREB
glutamate
PROTEIN CREB
The protein CREB can switch genes on or off. Genes code the
production of protein molecules.
With repeated neural firing a nerve cell’s genes produce synapse
strengthening proteins, enabling LTP.
Boosting CREB production might lead to increased production of
proteins that help reshape synapses and consolidate STM into LTM.
- sea slugs, mice and fruit flies
STORING MEMORIES IN THE BRAIN
There are three types of long-term memories. They are
 explicit memories,
 implicit memories and
 flashbulb memories.
Explicit memory is our memory for facts and experiences. For example, the name of the street where we live, what we had for lunch
today, what we did last night. It is processed through the hippocampus of the brain.
Explicit Memory  memory of facts and experiences that one can consciously know and “declare.” (Also called
declarative memory)
Implicit memory is our memory for skills and procedures that are retrieved without conscious recollection. Examples include how to
walk, how to drive, and how to play the piano. These memories are processed through the cerebellum.
Implicit memory  retention independent of conscious recollection. (Also called nondeclarative or procedural memory)
If you damage your hippocampus you would be unable to form new memories for facts and experiences. You would however still
remember how to do things.
The most interesting type of long-term memory is the flashbulb memory. These are memories of significant, emotional events. It is like
you take a picture of the event and put it into your memory where it stays forever.
Flashbulb memory  a clear memory of an emotionally significant moment or event.
Ex. Where were you on September 11, 2001? Where were you when Kennedy was shot? Where were you when we
landed on the moon?
How do we get information into long-term memory and how does our brain store all that information? The answers come from brain
research.
ENHANCING MEMORY
THE ROLE OF EMOTION
STORING IMPLICIT AND EXPLICIT MEMORIES
A memory to be enters the cortext,
through the senses, then wends its way
into the brains depths. Precisely where it
goes depends on the type of
information. This is illustrated
dramatically by those who cannot
produce new memories. People with
amnesia  loss of memory.
HM is the most important patient in the
history of brain science. He was an
amnesiac. Researchers have collected
2401 sections of his brain.
ALL THE AMNESIA VIDEOS!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0Od5DrdPA4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vwigmktix2Y
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehtk3NfnX4A
Jimmy’s Story page 271
STORING MEMORIES IN THE BRAIN
Research has shown that our brains build our memories like a jigsaw puzzle. It invents
new pieces if some are missing. This is why some of our memories are very accurate
while others are not.
Research has also shown that each memory appears to activate a specific pattern of
firing in the neurons, because every memory begins as an impulse. This leaves a track
at the synapses where neurons communicate with each other. With increased activity
in a particular pathway, connections between the neurons strengthen, and the
neurotransmitters are released more easily. This process is called long-term
potentiation.
Now that we have memories in storage how do we go about retrieving all of that
valuable information? Well, we have to either recall it or recognize it.
BRAIN AND MEMORY
The parts of the brain involved in this are the hippocampus  a neural center that
is located in the limbic system; helps process explicit memories for storage.
Found in the temporal lobe neural centre and part of the brain’s limbic
system.
Damage to the Hippocampus:
With left hippocampus damage people have trouble remembering verbal
information.
With right hippocampus damage people have trouble remembering visual design
and locations.
Subregions are active when associating names with faces.
The Hippocampus is also involved in memories when we sleep.
Hippocampus is active during slow wave sleep. This is when memories are
processed for later retrieval.
It acts as a loading dock for temporarily holding the remembered episode –
smell, feel, sound, and location.
Then the memories shift to storage somewhere else. This is memory
consolidation.
Once stored our past experiences activate various parts of the frontal and
temporal lobe.
The cerebellum is also involved in the formation of memories.
Plays a key role in forming and storing the implicit memories created by classical
conditioning.
Ex) Woman with amnesia saw her doctor everyday. The doctor would have to
introduce himself everyday and shake the woman’s hand. One day he shook her hand
with a tack in his hand, pricking her hand. The next day when the doctor went to
shake the patients hand, she refused but could not explain why. Having been
classically conditioned, she just wouldn’t do it.
Damage – people cannot develop certain conditioned reflexes such as the eye blink
Storage: Retaining Information
Storing Memories in the Brain
MEMORY DISORDERS
1. Alzheimer’s Disease –buildup of protein in the brain that causes
neurons to die.
2. Korsakoff’s Syndrome – related to alcohol consumption. A lack
of vitamin B1 – thiamine causes people to confabulate. They make
up information to fill in memory gaps. They also have smaller
hippocampi.
MEMORY LOSS: A CASE STUDY (E.P.)
INFANTILE AMNESIA
We have an explicit – implicit memory system.
The implicit reactions and skills are learned during infancy and reach far into our
future yet as adults we recall nothing (explicitly) of our first three years.
RETRIEVAL: GETTING INFORMATION OUT
The last stage in the memory model is retrieval, or getting information out of memory
so that we can use it. There are two different kinds of retrieval: recall and
recognition.
Recall is our ability to draw information out of storage and into conscious awareness.
Recall is used on tests in school in the form of fill-in-the-blank questions, short answers,
and essay question.
Recognition is our ability to match a current event or fact with something already in
memory. It is used on tests in school in the form of multiple choice questions and
matching questions.
We are better at recognition than we are at recall.
So how do we get to the memories that we need to retrieve?
Recall  a measure of memory in
which the person must retrieve
information learning earlier, as on a
fill-in-the-blank test.
Recognition  a measure of memory
in which the person need only
identify items previously learned, as
on a multiple-choice test.
Relearning  a measure of memory
that assesses the amount of time
saved when learning material for a
second time.
RETRIEVAL CUES
Use retrieval cues. These are events, feelings, places,
or any other stimulus that is linked to a specific
memory.
Mnemonic devices work well for retrieval.
Priming is the primary retrieval cue used. Priming 
the activation, often unconsciously, of particular
associations in memory.
Priming is sometimes called ‘memoryless
memory’. Invisible memory without explicit
remembering.
Ex. If walking down a hallway, you see a poster of
a missing child, you will then be unconsciously
primed to interpret an ambiguous adult-child
interaction as a possible kidnapping. Although
you don’t consciously remember the poster, it
predisposes your interpretation.
Ex. Meeting someone who remind us of someone
we’ve previously met can awaken out associated
feelings about the earlier person, which may
transfer to the new context.
Priming
CONTEXT EFFECTS – EXTERNAL CONTEXTS AND
INTERNAL EMOTIONS INFLUENCE MEMORY RETRIVAL.
While taking notes for your psychology test
in your bedroom upstairs, you realize you
need to sharpen your pencil. You get up,
walk downstairs and forget what you were
supposed to do. Once you are back in your
bedroom you remember. The context of the
bedroom helps you to remember the
encoded thought that you needed to sharpen
your pencil.
A similar contextual influence is called déjà
vu  that eerie sense that “I’ve
experienced this before.” Cues from the
current situation may subconsciously
trigger retrieval of an earlier experience.
Retrieval: Getting Information Out
Context Effects
RETRIEVAL CUES
After learning to move a
mobile by kicking, infants
had their learning
reactivated most strongly
when retested in the same
rather than a different
context (Butler & RoveeCollier, 1989).
MEMORY RETRIEVAL
MEMORIES AND MOODS
Events in the past may have around a specific emotion that later primes us to recall its
associated events.
‘An emotion is like a library room into which we place memory records. We best
retrieve those records by returning to that emotional room.’ –Gordon Bower
What we learn in one state – be it drunk or sober – may be more easily recalled
when we are again in that state. Called state-dependant memory.
Now don’t be thinking you can study drunk and then take your tests drunk. What
people learn while intoxicated they don’t recall well in any state because alcohol
disrupts storage. But they recall it slightly better when again drunk. Ex. Someone who
hides money when drunk may forget the location until drunk again,
There is also Mood Dependant Memory
or Mood-Congruent Memory  the
tendency to recall experiences that
are consistent with one’s current
good or bad mood.
This applies to that some adolescents
despise or think their parents are
terrible because of ‘teen angst’. They
associate their mood with their parents.
Later on, when the ‘angst’ levels out, they
view the parents in a more positive light.
FORGETTING
To discard the clutter of useless or out-of-date information – were you parked the car
yesterday, what your old junior high locker combination was – is a good thing. We
get rid of the junk to hold onto the more important or prevalent information.
So it’s actually important to know how to forget.
Pollyanna Principle - Pleasant items and events are usually processed more efficiently
and accurately than less pleasant items.
FORGETTING
Forgetting as encoding failure
Information never enters long-term memory
Attention
External
events
Short- Encoding
Sensory
term
memory Encoding
memory
Encoding
failure leads
to forgetting
Longterm
memory
A.J. –
Remembers every day of her life in vivid
detail. Includes all the joy and all the hurt.
THE WOMAN WHO COULDN’T FORGET
RETRIEVAL: A JOURNEY INTO MEMORY (7 SINS)
SCHACTER’S SEVENS SINS OF
MEMORY
 3 Sins of Forgetting
Absent-mindedness – inattention to detail leads
to encoding failure (our mind is elsewhere as we
lay down the car keys).
Transience – storage decay over time (after we
part ways with our former classmates, unused
information fades).
Blocking- inaccessibility of stored information
(seeing an actor in an old movie, having the
name on the tip of your tongue but experience
retrieval failure – we cannot get it out).
3 Sins of distortion
 Misattribution – confusing the source of information
(putting words in someone else’s mouth or
remembering a dream as an actual happening).
 Suggestibility – the lingering effects of misinformation
(a leading question, for example in child molestation
cases).
 Bias – belief colored recollections (current feeling
towards a friend may color out recalled initial
feelings)
1 Sin of intrusion
 Persistence – unwanted memories (being haunted by
images of a sexual assault).
ENCODING FAILURE
Much of what we sense, we never notice and what we fail to encode, we will never
remember. Age can affect encoding efficiency. The brain area that jump into action
when young adult encode new information are less responsive in older adults. This
slower encoding helps explain age-related memory decline.
It’s the process of what you remember and the specifics you can get from it.
Think if it like a pattern.
ENCODING FAILURE – WHICH
PENNY IS THE REAL THING?
ENCODING FAILURE
ENCODING FAILURE – STORAGE DECAY
Even after encoding something well, we sometimes later forget it.
Scientist involved most in this was Hermann Ebbinghaus.
Ebbinghaus learned more lists of nonsense syllables and measured how much he
retained when relearning from each list, from 20 minutes to 30 days later.
The result… the forgetting curve. The course of forgetting is initially rapid, then lvels
off with time.
Ex. High school language courses – forget a certain amount by 3 years. But 25 years
later, you still remember the amount.
Ebbinghaus Curve
FORGETTING AS STORAGE FAILURE
Sometimes we encode the information well but we still can’t retrieve it. The next
three ways of forgetting have to do with storage failure.
 Misattribution – This happens when we confuse who said what and when they said it; or when we
remember a dream as an actual event.
 Suggestibility – This happens when others mislead us into thinking that we remember certain
information. We will look at this idea a little later in the lesson.
 Bias – This happens when our current thoughts and feelings change what we thought or felt at an
earlier time.
RETRIEVAL FAILURE
This type of forgetting probably accounts for most of our forgetting. You encoded the information, you stored
the information, but you can’t retrieve it. The last way of forgetting has to do with retrieval failure.
Persistence – This happens when we forget unwanted memories. This is the stuff that is better left forgotten.
This is often called motivated forgetting. It can serve as protection from anxiety or potentially distressing
information.
One other reason that we often can’t retrieve information is because old information and new information
compete for our attention. This is called interference. There are two types of interference: retroactive
interference and proactive interference.
RETRIEVAL FAILURE – INFERENCE
Learning some items may interfere with retrieving others, especially if the information is similar.
Ex. If one person tells you their phone number, you will probably remember it. Now if 2 more
people gave you their numbers, each subsequent number is harder to remember.
Proactive Interference  the disruptive effect of prior learning on the recall of new
information. FORWARD ACTING. Occurs when something you learned earlier
disrupts your recall of something you experience later. As you collect more and more
information, your mental attic never fills, but gets cluttered. Tuning out the clutter
helps us focus. Sometimes forgetting is adaptive.
Retroactive Interference  the disruptive effect of new learning on the recall of old
information. BACKWARD ACTING. Occurs when new information makes it harder to
recall something you learned earlier. It is like a second stone disrupting the waves of
the first stone you threw in the water. Pg. 283 – Retrieving passwords.
SLEEP PLAYS A ROLE
Retrieval Failure
Interference
FORGETTING AS INTERFERENCE
RETRIEVAL FAILURE – MOTIVATED FORGETTING
To remember our past is often to revise
it.
Called Repression in psychoanalytic
theory, the basic defense
mechanism that banishes from
consciousness anxiety-arousing
thoughts, feelings, and memories.
MEMORY RECONSTRUCTION
When it is time to retrieve something from memory, your brain must put together all
of the pieces that are stored there. Sometimes pieces of information are missing and
the brain has to fill in the gaps. It does this sometimes with false information. Once
this false information get in there, it is pretty hard to distinguish it from the true
information. We believe the false information to be true. This is called the
misinformation effect  incorporating misleading information into one’s
memory of an event.
Evidence for the misinformation effect can be seen when we look at eyewitness
testimony. Quite often what we remember is determined by the types of questions
and the wording of the questions that we are asked. These types of questions are
called leading questions. This idea put into question the reliability of eyewitness
testimony. Young children are very susceptible to the misinformation effect. They can
easily construct false memories
BARTLETT’S CONSTRUCTIVE MEMORY PROCESS
Leveling: Material in the story gets simplified because the teller makes judgments
about which details are important.
Sharpening: The teller also makes judgments about what information is important
and highlights or overemphasizes details.
Assimilation: The teller also changes details for a better fit with his or her own
background or knowledge.
Among the frailest parts of memory are
their source. We may recognize someone
but not remember where we recognize
them from. We may dream an event and
later be unsure whether it happened. Or
did we hear something or see it?
Source Amnesia  attributing to the
wrong source an event we have
experienced, heard about, read
about, or imagined. (Also called
source misattribution.) Source
amnesia, along with the
misinformation effect, is at the heart
of many false memories.
CREATING FALSE MEMORIES: A LABORATORY
STUDY
DISCERNING TRUE AND FALSE
MEMORIES (PGS 290 – 292 )
Memory studies
False Memory Syndrome
 condition in which a person’s identity and relationships center around a false but strongly believed
memory of traumatic experience
 sometimes induced by well-meaning therapists
 Eye witness testimony - Picture on left is a blended composite of happy and angry.
When asked to explain why the person was either happy or angry those asked to explain an
angry expression remembered an angry picture (right).
REPRESSED OR
CONSTRUCTED MEMORIES OF
ABUSE?
Areas of agreement
Sexual abuse happens
Injustice happens
Forgetting happens
Recovered memories are incomplete
Memories before 3 years are unreliable
Hypnotic memories are unreliable
Memories can be emotionally upsetting
IMPROVING MEMORY
IMPROVE YOUR MEMORY
Study repeatedly to boost recall
Spend more time rehearsing or actively thinking about the
material
Make material personally meaningful
Use mnemonic devices
 associate with peg words--something already stored
 make up story
 chunk--acronyms
IMPROVE YOUR MEMORY
Activate retrieval cues--mentally recreate situation and mood
Recall events while they are fresh-- before you encounter
misinformation
Minimize interference
Test your own knowledge
rehearse
determine what you do not yet know