What is the role of memory in daily life?
Memory is essential for applying what we have learned.
What are the 3 basic functions of memory?
Encoding - input of info into memory system, Storage - retaining encoded info, Retrieval - getting info back into awareness.
What is a flashbulb memory?
Clear and emotionally charged memories, formed under stress or intense emotion, often remembered vividly but not always accurate.
What are the two main types of amnesia?
Anterograde amnesia - can’t form new memories, hippocampus is often damaged, procedural memory intact, retrograde amnesia - forgets past episodic memories.
What is rehearsal?
Repeating info continuously.
Why is memory important to learning?
Learning is ineffective without retention.
What are the types of encoding?
Semantic - meaning based (most effective), Visual - images, Acoustic - sounds, particularly words.
What are the functions of the amygdala?
Regulates fear and aggression, encodes emotional memories more deeply, essential for memory consolidation under emotional arousal, damage can weaken conditioned fear responses.
What is memory construction vs reconstruction?
Construction = encoding new info, reconstruction = retrieving and reshaping info (can introduce errors).
What is chunking?
Grouping info into units.
What was Lashley’s Lesion Studies?
Tried to find the “engram” (the neurons - physical) by lesioning (traumatic changes to organs or tissues) rat brains, led to the equipotentiality hypothesis (other brain areas can take over memory functions).
How is information retrieved?
Recall - no cues, Recognition - choose from options, Relearning - faster learning when info was previously learned.
What are the functions of the hippocampus?
Crucial for semantic and episodic memory, involved in recognition and spatial memory, transfers new learning into long-term memory, damage leads to anterograde amnesia (can’t form new memories).
What is suggestibility?
Creation of false memories due to external suggestions.
What is elaborative rehearsal?
Linking new info with prior knowledge for deeper processing.
What are the types of rehearsal in Short-term memory?
Active - repeating info, Elaborative - linking new info to existing knowledge.
What are the types of Long-term memory?
Explicit - semantic: facts and general knowledge: episodic: personal experiences/events, Implicit - procedural: skills/tasks: priming: association triggers: emotional conditioning: learned emotional responses.
What are the functions of the cerebellum?
Processes procedural memories, key in classical conditioning, even without the hippocampus procedural memory can stay intact.
What is false memory syndrome?
To recall inaccurate or suggested memories (repression vs suggestion).
What are mnemonic devices?
Memory aids, acroynyms.
What are Schater’s 7 Sins of Memory?
Transience (forgetting) - fading over time, absentmindedness (forgetting) - lapses in attention, blocking (forgetting) - tip of the tongue, misattribution (distortion) - source confusion, suggestibility (distortion) - false memories from suggestion, bias (distortion) - distorted by beliefs, persistence (intrusion) - unwanted memories that won’t fade.
What are the stages of memory storage?
Sensory memory - immediate and brief (sights/sounds), Short-term memory - lasts 15-30 seconds and requires rehearsal, Long-term memory - unlimited capacity and organized by semantic networks (related concepts are linked in groupings of information).
What are the functions of the prefrontal cortex?
Handles semantic tasks and higher order processing, left frontal region - memory encoding, right frontal region - memory retrieval.
What is the misinformation effect?
Loftus and Palmer study - wording of questions alters the memory of events.
What is the self-reference effect?
To personalize content to improve encoding (make it meaningful to you).