Transcript Enhancing Memory - VCE Sociology resources

Enhancing Memory
Poor encoding
STM
Elaborate encoding
LTM
What did you recall?
Encoding
• The process of converting information into a
useable form that can be stored and represented
in memory
 Shallow Processing: Information’s physical or
sensory attributes (eg, colour, size, shape and texture)
 Moderate Processing: Stimulus is encoded
according to acoustic or phonetic qualities. Requires
attention and increases the chance of retaining in
LTM.
 Deep Processing: Links new information with
information already stored in LTM, with categories and
subcategories. Enhances retrieval chances through
elaboration and more effective retrieval cues.
Elaboration
• Describes the way in which new
information is made more meaningful by
linking it to prior information already stored
in LTM.
Elaboration
• Self-referencing by relating new
information to personal experiences or
your personal situation in some way.
Elaborative Rehearsal
• The process of linking new information in a
meaningful way with information already
stored in memory or with other new
information to aid its storage and retrieval
from LTM.
Elaboration
• Similar concept
in some
alternative
education
programs (eg,
learn a topic
from all possible
angles)
Context-Dependent Cues
• Environment cues in the specific context
(setting) where a memory was formed,
which act as retrieval cues to help access
the memories formed in that context.
• Eg, sights, sounds, smells, etc.
Context-Dependent Cues
• Police taking an eye-witness back to the
scene of the crime to help retrieve
information from LTM.
Context-Dependent Cues
State-Dependent Cues
• Cues associated with an individual’s
internal physiological and/or psychological
state at the time the memory was formed,
which act as retrieval cues to help access
those memories.
State-Dependent Cues
• If information is learned when you are
happy, sad, intoxicated, sober, calm or
aroused, that information is more likely to
be retrieved when you are in the same
‘state’.
Mnemonic Devices
• Retrieval is simplified with the use of a
mnemonic aid because organisation is
enhanced.
• The information memorised is changed into
a form which it can link in or fit in more
easily with the information already stored
in memory.
Mnemonic Devices
• Narrative chaining, method of loci, peg
word method, acrostics, acronyms and
rhymes.
Narrative Chaining
• Linking otherwise unrelated items to one
another (‘chaining’) to form a meaningful
sequence or story (‘narrative’).
Narrative Chaining
• Make up a story to help remember the
following words:
 Dog, ball, house, petrol, supermarket, party,
chairs, box.
Narrative Chaining
• The playful dog retrieved a ball that was
thrown towards a house. The owner of the
property worked at a petrol station on
weekdays and a supermarket on
weekends. His wife was planning a party
for their five-year-old son. The games
planned were musical chairs, and Jack in
the box.
Narrative Chaining
Method of Loci
• This technique uses a well-learned
sequence of locations as a series of
retrieval cues for the information to be
recalled.
Method of Loci
• Visualise entering your house through the
gate, up the path to the front door, through
the foyer, etc and each location would act
as a cue for what needs to be
remembered.
Method of Loci
• The concrete in the front of the gate has
sensory memory engraved in it, the path
has an eyeball from an old toy on the
ground to represent iconic (visual)
memory, the door has an ear-shaped door
knob to represent echoic (auditory)
memory, the foyer has an embroided sign
saying “short-term memory” instead of
“home sweet home”, etc.
Method of Loci
Method of Loci
Rhyming Activity
• Capsicum, clothes-rack,
Dalmatian, boat, iPod,
tree, wheelbarrow, flute,
toothpick, $5