Human Memory: Retention and Retrieval

Human Memory: Retention and Retrieval

1. What theories explain why we forget?

   • Types of memory retrieval
     • Recall: Producing fact purely from memory
     • Recognition: identifying an item as being on you have been exposed to previously
     • Confusing recall and recognition?
       • being confident about a test and then doing poorly
         • we see something that looks familier when studying, sense that is is familiar and pass over it and devote more cognitive processes to unfamiliar things
           • false sense of security
   • What is normal forgetting?
     • Power Law of forgetting
       • Memory performance deteriorates over time
     • Spacing effect
       • learning in intervals is best
   • Why do we forget?
     • Decay: forgetting occurs due to time passing
     • Interference: recalling some info interference with recalling other info
       • Retrograde interference: newly aquired knowledge impedes on the recall of older knowledge
       • Proactive interference: old info impedes on aquiring new info
       • serial position curve:
         • recent effects: superior recall of words at end of list
         • Primacy interference: great recall of words at beginning of list

2. What are the sins of memory & how do false memories form?

   • Sins of ommisson
     • Transience (decay)
     • Absentmindedness: (missing keys) not enough info was given during time of encoding
     • Blocking: tip of the tongue
   • Sins of Commison
     • Missatribution: incorrect recall
     • suggestiblity: accepting false suggestions made by others
     • Bias: current feelings distort world view
     • Persistence: unwanted recall that is distubing (PTSD)
   • Flashbulb memory:vivid memory of an event
   • Constructive nature of memories
     • prior experience affects recall
       • autobiographical memories: constructive: positive self esteem = positive memories
       • eye witness testimony: most common source of wrongful conviciton
         • what happens to the brain during false memories?
           • hippocampus: high activation
           • parahippocampul gyrus: responds to true memory

3. How does context impact memory?

   • encoding specificity principle
     • the probabiliy or retrieving something now is similar to how you learn it
       • retrieving something in the same conditions you learned it
   • environmental stimuli
     • learning info in the same enviroment (smell included)
   • mood context
     • positive mood= remembering positive words

4. What are some memory disorders?

   • super memories
     • savants
   • synethesia
     • smelling sounds
   • hypertymesia
     • recall almost every day of their lives
   • amnesia
     • retrograde
     • anteriograde
   • Alzheimers