Transcript Memory - Stanford Psychology Department

Memory
Memory
The ability of the mind or of an individual or
organism to retain learned information and
knowledge of past events and experiences
and to retrieve it
Organization of experience….what would you
do without it?
Outline
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Types of Memory
Memory Processes
Forgetting
Memory Distortions
Memory Disorders
Memory in the brain
Types of Memory
• working (short-term) vs. long-term
• episodic vs. generic
• explicit vs. implicit (how to become
famous overnight, Jacoby)
• procedural (riding a bike) vs. declarative
(Lance…)
Types of Memory
Working memory:
The “magic number” for digit span, and
more.
Sets a limit on performance, good
thing?
“loading platform” for long term memory
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Memory Processes
• How do memories get from “loading
platform” to long term?
• Then, how do they get back?
Memory Processes
Encoding & Storage:
• time spent in working memory?
rehearsal?
• attention and engagement
• connection to what we already know
• depth of processing (typeface vs.
meaning)
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ta-da!
Memory Processes
Retrieval:
• memory cues & context (Charlie
Chaplain and the scuba divers)
• depth of processing, easier to find
• retrieval failure or memory loss? Or
forgetting vs. misplacement?
Seventh grade classmates…
Forgetting
We are forgetting all the time.
Decay-- metabolic processes wear down
“memory traces”
Displacement-- awake vs. asleep during
recall interval, interference
Memory Distortions
• Errors of commission as opposed to errors of
omission-- unwittingly reconstruct an event
based on what we think and know
• Schemas and scripts (professor’s office)
• Elizabeth Loftus, studies of eyewitness
testimony
• “Recovered” memories and controversy
Do distortions replace real memories, or just
interfere with recall?
Memory Disorders
Two main types of Amenesia:
• Anterograde (“forward”) Amnesia
• Retrograde (“backwards”) Amnesia
Memory Disorders
Anterograde Amnesia
• problem: forming new memories postinjury/operation
• Korsikoff’s Syndrome (chronic
alcoholics), Alzheimer’s, patients like
H.M. with hippocampal/thalamus
damage
• can read, write, converse, remember life
until damage was done
H.M.:
• “Right now, I’m wondering, Have I done or said
anything amiss? You see, at this moment
everything lookds clear to me, but what
happened just before? That’s what worries me.
It’s like waking from a drea; I just don’t
remember.”
• “…Every day is alone in itself, whatever
enjoyment I’ve had, and whatever sorrow I’ve
had.”
Memory Disorders
Retrograde Amnesia:
• problem: loss of memory for some period
before brain injury
• ECT and head traumas
• “trace consolidation theory” -- memory
hasn’t had time to become firmly
established, but... several years?
• sometimes memories do come back
gradually
Memory Disorders
What amnesiacs can do:
• procedural memory tasks (mirror
tracing)
• implicit memory tasks ( _L_P_A_T)
• behavioral conditioning
Memory in the Brain
Important brain areas:
• Pre-frontal cortex--retrieval & working
memory
• Hippocampus & other parts of
Thalamus--long-term memories
• Amygdala--emotional events, fear
conditioning
• Occipital & Temporal Lobes--visual
memories
HIPPOCAMPUS