[Intro. to Psy Course Note] Ch 7

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Memory

Stage of memory

  • 3 stages of memory: Atkinson-Schiffrin Model
    • Memory: active system that receives, stores, organizes, alters, and recovers information
    • Sensory memory 感覺記憶
    • Short-term memory (STM) 短期記憶
    • Long-term memory (LTM) 長期記憶
  • Key peocesses
    • Encoding 收錄: converting info into a usable form
    • Storage
    • Retrieval 提取
  • Sensory memory: stores an exact copy of incoming info for a few seconds or less (either what is seen or heard)
    • We are normally unaware of sensory memory
    • Selective attention to sensory memory transfers information to STM
    • Iconic memory 影像記憶 (半秒)
    • Echoic memory (2秒)

Short-term (working) memory

  • We are consciously aware of short-term memories
  • Encoding in STM is usually phonetic, by sound
  • Very sensitive to interruption or interference
  • Working memory: part of STM, like a mental scratchpad
  • 保留最近的經驗 or 從 LTM 提取
  • Rehearsal in STM
    • Maintenance rehearsal 維持性複誦
      • Rote rehearsal (rote learning) 反覆複誦: the use of repetition to transfer information to LTM; “not very effective”
    • Elaborative processing / rehearsal 精緻性處理 / 複誦: links new information with existing memories and knowledge in LTM; more effective way to transfer information to LTM
  • Chunking in STM

Long-term memory

  • Encoding in LTM is usually based on meaning
  • 20 memories
    • American: me
    • Chinese: us
  • LTM memories are only rarely permanent
  • Elaborative processing can revise memories on basis of reasoning or adding new, possibly false, information
    • False memories 虛假記憶: can seem accurate but they “never happened”
    • Source confusion 來源混淆: occurs when the origins of a memory are “misremembered”
  • Organize memories
    • Network model 網路模型: LTM stored as a network of linked ideas
    • Reintegration 重整: memories that are reconstructed or expanded by starting with one memory and then following network of links to related memories
    • Cognitive interview 認知晤談: using reintegration to improve the memory of eyewitnesses (Geiselman & Fisher, 1987)
      • Use of various cues and strategies to improve eyewitness memory
      • Recreating the crime scene and witnesses revisit the scene in their imagination or in person
      • 35% more correct information than standard questioning
  • Types of LTM
    • Procedural (skilled) memory 程序記憶: LTM for conditioned responses and learned skills (how to do things)
    • Declarative (fact) memory 陳述性記憶: LTM for factual information
      • Semantic memory 語意記憶: part of declarative memory for impersonal facts and everyday knowledge
      • Episodic memory 個人事件記憶 / 情節記憶: part of declarative memory for personal experiences linked with specific times and places

Measuring memory

  • You either remember or you don’t ? not really
  • Partial memories are common
    • Tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) state: feeling that a memory is available but not quite retrievable
    • Feeling of knowing: feeling that allows people to predict beforehand whether they will be able to remember something
    • Déjà vu 似曾相識: the feeling that you have already experienced a situation that you are experiencing for the first time
  • Recall 回憶: direct retrieval of facts or info
    • Hardest to recall items in the middle of an ordered list; known as the “serial position effect” 序列位置效應
    • Easier to remember first and last items in a list
  • Recognition: previously learned material is correctly identified
    • Usually superior to recall
    • Distractors 誘答選項: false items included with a correct item
      • Wrong choices on multiple-choice tests
    • How to prevent false identification of witnesses (black, tall, young)
      • It’s better to have all the distractors look like the person witnesses described
      • Witnesses should be warned that the culprit may not be present
      • Better to show one photo at a time (a sequential lineup). for each photo, the witness must decide whether the person is the culprit before another photo is shown
  • Relearning:
    • Used to measure memory of prior learning
    • Savings scores 省時分數: amount of time saved when relearning info
  • Implicit and explicit memories
    • Explicit memory 外顯記憶: past experiences that are “consciously” brought to mind
    • Implicit memory 內隱記憶: a memory not known to exist; memory that is “unconsciously” retrieved
      • Priming 促發: when cues are used to activate hidden memories

Forgetting

  • Forgetting in LTM
    • Curve of forgetting 遺忘曲線: graph that shows the amount of memory information remembered after varying lengths of time
    • Nonsense syllables 無意義音節: meaningless three-letter words (fej, quf) that test learning and forgetting
  • Encoding failure in LTM
    • Encoding failure 收錄失敗: when a memory was never formed in the first place; failure to store sufficient info to form a useful memory
    • Other people may all “look alike” due to encoding failure (臉盲?)
  • Storage failure in LTM
    • Memory traces 記憶痕跡: “physical changes” in nerve cells or brain activity that occur when memories are stored
    • Memory decay 記憶(痕跡)衰退: when memory traces become weaker; fading or weakening of memories
    • Disuse 不用: theory that memory traces weaken when memories are not periodically used or retrieved
  • Retrieval failure in LTM: cue-dependent forgetting
    • Cue-dependent forgetting 線索依賴的遺忘: failure to access memories due to the “missing of retrieval cues”
    • Availability 可獲得性: a memory is available when it is stored in LTM
    • Accessibility 易取性: a memory is accessible in LTM when it can be successfully retrieved
    • Information in LTM can be available but NOT accessible
    • Memory cue 記憶線索: any stimulus associated with a memory; usually enhances retrieval of a memory
      • A person may “forget” (be inaccessible) if cues are missing at retrieval time
  • State-dependent learning 狀態依賴式記憶
    • State-dependent learning 狀態關連學習: when memory retrieval is influenced by bodily state at time of learning; if your body state is the same at the time of learning AND the time of retrieval, retrieval will be improved
    • The effect of mood on memory: emotional cues and memory
      • When you are happy, more likely to remember recent happy events
      • When you are in a bad mood, more likely to remember unpleasant events
  • Interference 干擾
    • Tendency for new memories to impair retrieval of older memories, and the reverse
    • Retroactive interference 逆向干擾: tendency for new memories to interfere with retrieval of old memories (新的搞舊的)
    • Proactive interference 前向干擾: prior learning inhibits (interferes with) recall of later learning (舊的搞新的)
  • Transfer of training
    • Positive transfer 正遷移: mastery of one task aids learning or performing another
      • Riding a bicycle (balance and turn) and riding a motorcycle
    • Negative transfer 負遷移: mastery of one task conflicts with learning or performing another
      • Back up a car and back up a car with a trailer attached to it
      • A pull-type handle on a door that must be pushed open
  • Repression and suppression
    • Repression 潛抑: “unconsciously” pushing painful, embarrassing, or threatening memories out of awareness / consciousness
      • Motivated forgetting
    • Suppression 壓抑: “consciously” putting something painful or threatening out of mind or trying to keep it from entering awareness
      • To avoid thoughts associated with a painful emotional event
  • The recovered memory / false memory debate 記憶恢復或假記憶的爭論
    • “Recovered” repressed memories of sexual abuse
    • It is easy to create false memories by using hypnosis
    • Studies of false memories: Elizabeth Loftus
      • Misinformation and false memory
  • Eyewitness memory 證人記憶
    • Elizabeth Loftus (1979)
    • Postevent information 事後訊息可以造成扭曲
      • Speed estimate-smash: 40+ mile/hr; contact: 30 mile/hr
      • Broken glass? Smash: 1/3; contact 14% (其實沒有)
    • Misinformation effect 錯誤訊息效應
      • Stop / yield misleading question study: stop sign (75% correct recognition) vs. yield sign (41% correct) (originally: a stop sign)
    • More confidence, higher accuracy ? NO
    • Children’s memory and witness: Steven Ceciand colleagues
      • Younger children are not reliable
      • Under pressure, provide what adults want
      • Mix others’ stories with own experiences

Memory and brain

  • Consolidation
    • Consolidation 固化: forming a LTM in the brain
    • Retrograde amnesia 回溯性失憶症 / “逆向”失憶症: forgetting events that occurred before an injury or trauma
    • Anterograde amnesia 前向失憶症 / “順向”失憶症: forgetting events that follow an injury or trauma
    • Electroconvulsive shock (ECS): mild electrical shock passed through the brain can prevent consolidation of any memory being formed at the time
  • Memory formation and the hippocampus
    • Hippocampus 海馬迴: brain structure associated with emotion and transfer of information passing from STM into LTM
    • If damaged, person can no longer “create” LTM and thus will always live in the present
    • Memories prior to damage will remain intact
    • H.M.
  • Memory, stress, and emotion
    • Flashbulb memory 閃光燈記憶: especially vivid and detailed recollection of an emotional event (during times of personal tragedy, accident, or other emotionally significant events, e.g.,9/11 2001 & 921 earthquake)
    • Includes both positive and negative experiences; great confidence is placed in them even though they may be inaccurate
    • Due to involvement of limbic system 邊緣系統
  • long-term potentiation 長效增益
    • Brain mechanism used to form lasting memories by strengthening the connection between neurons that become more active at the same time

Exceptional memory

  • Eidetic imagery 全現心像 (photographic memory 如照片般清晰的記憶): occurs when a person (usually a child) has visual images clear enough to be scanned or retained for at least 30 seconds
    • Usually projected onto a “plain” surface, like a blank piece of paper
    • Usually disappears during adolescence and is rare by adulthood (8% of preadolescent children, no adults)
  • Jill Price: exceptional episodic memory (highly superior autobiographical memory)
    • “…I run my entire life through my head every day and it drives me crazy!!!”
    • He had to devise ways to forget (such as writing on a piece of paper and then burn it)
  • Mr. S: exceptional semantic memory
    • Special memory tricks: mnemonics

Improving memory

  • Encoding strategies
    • Use “chunking” to organize information
    • Use “mental images”
    • Elaborative processing: look for connections to existing knowledge
    • Whole learning vs. part learning (study the largest meaningful amount of information you can at one time)
      • Short, organized info -> whole learning
      • Long, complicated info -> part learning
      • Progressive-part method 遞進分習法: for very long or complex material, break a learning task into a series of shorter sections (A, AB, ABC)
    • Beware serial position 序列位置: since most errors occur while remembering the middle of the list, spend more study time there
    • Encode retrieval cues: stimuli that aid retrieval are most effective if they were present during encoding; engage in more elaborative encoding to increase the number of available retrieval cues
    • Overlearning 過度學習: continue studying beyond bare mastery
    • Spaced practice 分散練習: alternate short study sessions with brief rest periods; better than massed practice, studying for long periods without rest periods (chunking)
  • Retrieval strategies
    • Cognitive interview: hits for recapturing context and jogging memories
      • Say or write down everything you can remember
      • Recall events or information in different orders
      • Recall from different viewpoints
      • Mentally return to the context of encoding
    • Retrieval practice: practice retrieval (e.g., through recitation) for feedback
      • Knowledge of results: lets you check progress
      • Recitation: summarizing aloud while learning
    • Extend how long you remember: lengthen the amount of time between retrieval practice
    • Clear your mind and prepare your body
      • Lack of sleep decreases retention; sleep aids consolidation
      • Hunger decreases retention

Mnemonics: memory “Trick”

  • Any kind of memory system or aid
    • Makes things meaningful
    • Makes info familiar
    • Uses mental pictures
    • Forms bizarre, unusual, or exaggerated mental associations
  • Create Acrostics 藏頭詩
  • Create Mental Images
    • Keyword method: aid to memory; using a familiar word or image to link two items
  • Create stories of chains: remember lists in order, forming an exaggerated association connecting item one to two, and so on
    • Method of Loci: take a mental walk, mentally walk along a familiar path, placing objects or ideas along the path