Transcript Memory

Chapter Seven
MEMORY
Section One
THREE KINDS OF MEMORY
MEMORY

The process by which we recollect prior
experiences and information and skills learned
in the past
DIFFERENT TYPES
1.
Episodic: a memory of a specific event
o
Example: what you wore to school yesterday
o
When we can remember specific details, it is
called a flashbulb memory
2.
Semantic or Generic: the general knowledge
that we remember although we do not know
when we first learned the material
o
3.
Includes historical facts and the ABCs
Implicit or Procedural: includes the skills we
have learned
o
For example, riding a bike
Section Two
THREE PROCESSES OF MEMORY

Regardless of the process we use, most include
three basic steps: encoding, storing, and
retrieving the information.
ENCODING

How we put the information into a form it can
be stored in
 Visual
Codes: remembering by creating a picture in
your mind
 Acoustic Codes: remember by repeating the
information to yourself
 Semantic Codes: remembering the information by
creating some type of order out of it; creating a
phrase out of the letters
STORAGE

How we maintain the information over time so
we don’t lose it
 Maintenance
Rehearsal: repeating
information over and over again
 Elaborative Rehearsal: make the information
meaningful by relating it to something we already
know
 Organizational Systems: we organize
information just as though our memory
was a large file cabinet
 Filing Errors: everyone has breakdowns in memory
at various times and for various reasons
RETRIEVAL

Returning stored information to conscious
thought
CONTEXT-DEPENDENT MEMORY

Memory retrieval depends on the situation in
which we first remembered the information

One study suggests if you study in the room
where you take a test, you do better than those
that studied elsewhere
STATE-DEPENDENT MEMORY
There is thought that our mood influences our
memory
 We will remember information when we are in
the same mood that we first remembered it in

ON THE TIP OF THE TONGUE
There are instances in which we know the
information but cannot bring it out
 Often we will say words that may be similar to
try to trigger our memory


When I cannot think of a person’s name, I go
through the alphabet…when I hit the letter of
the first name, I usually remember it!
Section Three
THREE STAGES OF MEMORY
SENSORY MEMORY
Stage One
 What we sense—see, hear, taste, feel, or smell,
is only kept for a fraction of a second
 The ability to have eidetic imagery (a
photographic memory) declines with age

SHORT-TERM MEMORY
Stage Two
 Also called working memory
 What we’re trying to actively remember is
stored in our short-term memory
 We have to rehearse the information to keep it
in our short term memory

LONG-TERM MEMORY
The third and final stage
 We have to take steps to put stuff in our longterm memory

 Mechanical
repetition: maintenance rehearsal
 Relating information to stuff we already know:
elaborative rehearsal

Psychologists are unaware of limits to our longterm memory
Section Four
FORGETTING AND MEMORY IMPROVEMENT
BASIC MEMORY TASKS
1.
2.
3.
Recognition: the easiest task, identifying that
we have remembered something in the past
Recall: not only recognizing that we have come
into contact with some information, but
actually being able to call the information back
into our mind
Relearning: we are often able to remember
something we thought we forgot after a brief
lesson (like speaking a foreign language)
TYPES OF FORGETTING
1.
2.
3.
4.
Interference: old memories are replaced by
new ones
Decay: when a memory fades away
Repression: pushing certain memories out of
our consciousness
Amnesia: severe memory loss caused by
injury, shock, fatigue, illness, or repression;
infantile amnesia refers to the fact that we
don’t remember things from when we were
infants
IMPROVING MEMORY
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Drill and Practice: go over the information to
be remembered over and over again
Relate the information to something you
already know
Form Unusual Associations: sometimes a
strange association will trigger our memory
Construct links between what you are having
trouble remembering and something that is
more easily remembered
Use Mnemonic Devices