Cognitive Psych Exam 2

generating information from memory

Remembering something that has happened before

• free recall (any order)
• serial recall (specific order)

When information dissipates over time

When the information is there, but you can't find it

because it requires passage of time without any interference

because it requires new information to be presented without any passage of time

Brown-Peterson Task

Was the counting part of the task preventing rehearsal, thus causing decay of letters OR are we displacing the letters due to holding the counting task in our short-term memory?

We pay more attention to the beginning (primacy) and the end (recency)

a method used to encode information into long term memory

• Maintenance Rehearsal - repeating over and over
• Elaborative Rehearsal - attaching meaning

Semantic, Episodic, Explicit, Implicit, Declarative, Procedural,

holds information stored in your general knowledge base, more generic info

• it doesn't have much to do with personal experience
• might even remember where you learned the memory
• organized by meaning

holds memories for specific events in which you yourself have somehow participated in

• recalls not only the information, but also the circumstances and context
• any memory that you can trace to a single point
• organized temporally - before, after, or during other events or times

9/11 attacks, high school graduation

knowing that football is a sport

motorcycle accident resulted in brain damage the rider could remember facts about life (where he went to school, names of people he worked with, ect. which is semantic memory, but he/she couldn't remember specific events of his life (birthdays and conversations which is episodic memory)

memories that are consciously recollected

• Specifically referring to a time or event
• An awareness of the effort it takes to recall memories

Memories that are not deliberate or conscious

• Shows evidence of prior learning and storage
• "unconscious" memory storage and recall

A study with Amnesia and Alzheimer patients. Those with Amnesia performed just as well at implicit memory tasks and healthy controls, while performing poorly at explicit memory tasks

Alzheimer patients who have learned specific skills like riding a bike or playing the piano were still able to perform the task but had no recollection that they knew how to or when they learned it

Partial Report Task: A group of letters were flashed on the screen for a very brief time (originally 50 - 500 milliseconds). After the letters were flashed, a high, middle, or low tone was played after to indicate which row the participants were to recall. The participants were able to recall on average about 75% of the letters on that row which was significantly better than the original report task that asked the participants recall all the letters they were shown. What made this study extra interesting was that if the tone was delayed even for 1 second, the participants did no better with the partial report task than they did with the whole report task. This is what indicated that in this storage system they information did not last very long. When the participants were asked to identify only vowels or only consonants, they again did no better than the whole reports which indicated that in this storage the material was raw and unprocessed and uncategorized.

Memory Span: In this study, participants were flashed a letter or word, and then asked to recognize which words were shown. What was discovered was that participants were more likely to confuse the letters or words that sounded the same versus ones of similar meaning (in the case of words). This is why it is believed that our short term memory is encoded in terms of sound (auditory).

Initial, brief storage of sensory information

That information is received, processed, and stored differently for each kind of memory

Sensory memory

short-term memory

Long-term memory

primacy effect

recency effect

When participants were given a list they were showed the recency effect more because they said they could still "hear" the words. If the participants were asked to do a task in between, then they would show more of the primacy effect and the recency effect would disappear.

• Coding: n/a
• Capacity: echoic - 10 to 15 seconds; iconic 1 to 2 seconds
• Duration: very short 1 to 2 seconds

• Coding: auditory 
• Capacity: 7 +/- 2 item or chunks
• Duration: 15 seconds without rehearsal1-2 minutes with rehearsal

• Coding: Semantic; meaning or gist
• Capacity: unlimited
• Duration: lifetime

Baddeley conducted a study with participants were given words that looked alike (same length), sounded alike, and had similar (semantically) meaning. After 20 minutes of working on another task to prevent rehearsal, they were asked to recall. In contrast to STM they mixed up words with similar meaning thus leading to the conclusion that LTM is stored semantically PAGE 132

Vivid, seemingly durable memories of specific, emotionally intense events that appear to last a lifetime

Memories "etched" or "burned" into our brain into our minds, like a snapshot

Usually, after a large event such as MLK shooting, 9/11, and the Challenger explosion, they will ask people initially what their memory of the event was and then ask again a few months after and the researches see how much it has changed.

After the Challenger Explosion individuals gave their reports of their own circumstances at 1 day and 9 months after. Though both reports were detailed and confident, they did not match. In fact, 85% of the participants missed at least one "Who, what, where, when, or why" question and 25% missed all of such questions

• Flashbulb memories aren't special
• They are highly superior autobiographical memories due to emotional arousal and extra rehearsal 
• They are supported by the fact that we have better recall of negatively salient memories

strong emotional reactions to an event tend to have more detailed memories of the event

In this model, information is received, processed, and stored in order. Information goes to our long term memory by encoding and rehearsal.

In this model there are many different components with the Central Executive being the at the center. It also includes to Phonological Loop, Visuospatial Sketchpad, and Episodic Buffer

• Directs flow of information, traiges, and activity based
• Functions more as an attentional system than a memory system ("conscious awareness")

Maintains and rehearses verbal and auditory information

Maintains and rehearse visual material

Temporary system for integrating information from different sources

• If you load up one of the loops too much it'll be difficult to recall
• You tend to remember things better when you hear and see it at the same time

Brown-Peterson Task; The participants were presented with 3 letters and then with a number and were asked to count backwards from that number by 3's out loud to prevent rehearsal. The length of time participants were asked to count backwards, greatly impacted their ability to recall the letters.

Sterberg conducted a study in which participants were given lists of letters to rehearse and encode. Then they were asked to recall if certain letters were on the list and found evidence that we retrieve our memories by using a serial exhaustive search because the decision time was the same for stimuli earlier and later on the lists.

In the memory span task, participants were given words and later asked to recognize the word amongst a list of other words. Because they mixed up words that sounded a like more often than anything else, it was concluded that our STM is encoded by auditory or in terms of sound.

• Retroactive Interference
• Proactive Interference
• Release from proactive interference

When newer information hurts memory of older information

Rehearsal of older information hurts recall of newer information

When something in the middle catches one's attention

• After 5 years our memory decreases then decreases even more after 30 years
• We lose a connection between visual and verbal memories
• visual memories last longer than verbal memories
• recognition is easier than recall

Our mind has two separate memory systems, verbal and visual. If we encode things both verbally and visually we will be able to recall them easier

• Mnemonic 
• Encoding Specificity 
• Spacing Effect
• State-Dependent Learning 
• Schemas and Experience

• Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally
• Never Eat Soggy Waffles

recalling information in same or similar context aids retrieval

Specific, effortful techniques that aid memory retention and retrieval; usually pair verbal and visual information together

studying in a cold room so you can retrieve info better since exam room will be cold

You remember information better if you space out your learning, compared to when you cram all at once

studying for an exam over the course of a week rather than the night before

when chemical or emotional states aid retrieval when paired at encoding and recall

no

only if not impaired

not too much

negative moods are more salient when in negative mood and the same with positive moods

Because we break up information that is meaningful and important to us in order to get the "gist" based on our past experiences

deletion of writing styles, names, and/or specific information

adding more importance to information based on schema

Trying to make sense of something by applying schemas

Thinking about your own memory

Istomina conducted a Grocery Store Study with children between 3 and 8 years of age. Each child was given a 20 item grocery list, but only those of 8 years of age tried to use various techniques to aid in remembrance such as asking to write it down or only getting a few items at a time

Chess Board Experiment where the pieces were first place in a logical way and then in a nonsensical one. When in logical way experts were able to remember where to place the pieces but when nonsensical, both experts and novices performed equally bad. 

Same results with Mental Rotation Task with Tetris

Expertise aids in memory, but is not transferable to other tasks

memories for actions or procedures

knowledge, facts, ideas; anything that can be recalled and described in words