Ch.6 Retrieving Memories from Long-Term StorageAnna Fraser, Holly Lester & Marah Lind

What is Long-Term Memory?• Described as a place for storing large amounts of

information for indefinite periods of time

Aspects of Long-Term Memory• Capacity• Unlimited• Not all information is retrievable at any given moment• Thomas Landauer (1986)- estimates the rate new information is learned and the rate information is forgotten/lost• 1 billion bits of information for an adult at

midlife (age 35)• Coding• If errors are made while recalling information from LTM, most likely semantic confusion• Baddeley (1966a & 1976)- semantic

similarities affect LTM

Aspects of Long-Term Memory

• Retention Duration & Forgetting• Harry Bahrick (1983 & 1984)- large portions of the originally acquired information remain accessible for over 50 years even thought the information was not used or rehearsed• Interference accounts for “forgetting,” not decay • Paired associates learning tasks- proactive v.

retroactive interference • Retrieval cues- the more possible targets

associated with a cue, the less chance of finding any one of them (Anderson & Neeley, 1996)

• Fan effect- the more facts are studied with a concept, more time is needed to retrieve a particular fact (Anderson 1974)

Aspects of Long-Term Memory• Retrieval of Information•Mnemonics• Method of loci- requires the learner to imagine a series

of places (locations) that have some sort of order to them• Interactive imagery- recall improves when images of

the to be remembered material were formed (Bower, 1970, paired associates learning experiment)• Pegword method- picturing the items with another set

of ordered “cues” (Bugelski, Kidd & Segman, 1968, paired associates tasks)• Not all mnemonics use imagery- recode the material

with mediators between the memory & the material (HOMES)

Aspects of Long-Term Memory• Retrieval of Information• Other Retrieval Principles• Categorization- organized material is more easily

recalled than unorganized material (Bousfield,1953)

• Encoding Specificity- encoding depends on the context in which the material is learned and recall is improved if in the context (Thomson & Tulving, 1970)• State-dependent learning/memory effect• Mood-dependent memory effect• Spacing effect• Encoding variability

• Cue Overload-retrieval cues are most effective when it is highly distinctive/dramatic & not related to other target memories

Aspects of Long-Term Memory• Retrieval of Information• The Testing Effect• Henry Roediger & colleagues- taking tests on

material improves the learning of it • A quiz requires more effort than (re)reading the

material• Counter over-confidence of highlighting or

underlining the text when rereading material

Semantic vs Episodic Memory• Episodic memory: holds

memories of specific events in which you yourself participated• Where you were on 9/11, memories

you can trace to a single time

• Semantic memory: holds information that has entered your general knowledge base• Information about language and

world knowledge• Organization of episodic memory is

temporal- events recorded in sequence• Organization of semantic memory is

arranged on the basis of meanings

Implicit vs Explicit Memory

• Explicit memories: things that are consciously recollected. • Ex: in recalling your last vacation, you refer to a specific time and series

of events. Your recall is something you are aware of

• Implicit memory: memory that is not deliberate or conscious but shows evidence of prior learning and storage. • Repetition priming: facilitation of the cognitive processing of information

after a recent exposure to that same information.• Ex: participants given a very brief exposure to a word (such as button)

and soon after are given a new word completion task. The repetition priming effect is demonstrated by an increased probability of responding “button” to the stimulus given in the word completion task

Declarative vs Procedural Memory

• Declarative memory: contains knowledge, facts, information, ideas • anything that can be recalled

and described in words, pictures, or symbols• Explicit and consciously

accessible

• Procedural memory holds information concerning action and sequences of actions. • implicitly represented and thus

not consciously accessible

The Levels of Processing View• Memory based on the initial encoding of the information to be remembered• Says that improvement in memory comes not from rehearsal and repetition

but from greater depth of analysis of the material. • Investigation (1975): 3 kinds of questions 1) asked if word printed in capital

letters. 2) asked if word rhymed with another word. 3) asked if the word fit into a sentence.

• To answer 1st question, you need look only at the typeface (physical processing). To answer 2nd, you need to read the word and think about what it sounds like (acoustic processing). To answer 3rd, you need to retrieve and evaluate the word’s meaning (semantic processing).

• “depth” of the processing is greatest for the third kind of question and least for the first kind of question. As predicted, on a surprise memory test later, words processed semantically were remembered best, followed by words processed acoustically.

The Reconstructive Nature of Memory

• Bartlett - believed that real world, unlike lab experiments, memory largely uses world knowledege and schemata - frameworks for organizing information. •Experimented with stories conducted on individuals over varying intervals from weeks to years - "The War of Ghosts"

Autobiographical memory

•Memories for events that the rememberer has been apart of.•Marigold Linton - studied her own memory.•wrote 2 descriptions everyday

• Brewer - 8 undergrads wrote down events at the sound of a beep at random times.

Flashbulb memories

• Standout memories linked to strong emotion. • Remembers where you were, what

you were eating ect.

Eyewhitness memory

• Episodic memory for a crime or other dramatic event that was experienced first hand.• Loftus - studies have demonstrated that peoples memories can be altered by asking misleading questions.

Recovered/ False memory debate• Debate over whether victims of abuse can suppress

incidents of abuse, retrieving these memories later in therapy or therapists that accidentally prompt their clients to create false memories of things that never happened.

• Loftus and Pickrell (1995) make no explicit claims about how easy it is to induce false memories or about how prevalent such memories are. They take the results as proof that false memories can be formed through suggestive questioning, and they offer a speculative account of the mechanisms responsible.

• 24 participants - recalled 68% true events, 29% of participants recalled the false event.

Amnesia • Anterograde - memory deficit extending forward in

time from the initial point of memory loss.• affects LTM but not working memory• affects memory regardless of modality• spares memory for general knowledge but grossly impairs

recall for new facts and events• spares skilled performance• hyperspecific learned memory

• Retrograde - loss of memory acquired before the onset of amnesia • time span varies enormously• most recent memories are most likely to be lost• memory consolidation - initially persists in a fragile state

and consolidates over time.